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THE U.C. C.QUARTERLY
VOLUME 3. NO. 4 FALL 1945
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Serving Travelers on Vacation or Business—An Important State Industry
PUBLISHED BY
UNEMPLOYMENT COMPENSATION COMMISSION OF NORTH CAROLINA
PAGE 86 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY FALL, 1945
The U. C. C. Quarterly
Volume 3 ; Number 4 Fall, 1945
Issued four limes a year al Haleigh, N. C, by the
UNEMPLOYMENT COMPENSATION COMMISSION OF
NORTH CAROLINA
Commissioners : Mrs. W. T. Bost, Raleigh; Judge C. E. Cowan,
Morganton; C. A. Fink, Spencer; R. Dave Hall, Belmont;
R. Grady Rankin, Charlotte; Dr. Harry D. Wolf, Chapel Hill.
State Advisory Council: Capus Waynick, High Point, Chair-man;
Willard Dowell, Raleigh; Marion W. Heiss, Greens-boro;
H. L. Kiser, Charlotte; Dr. Thurman D. Kitchin, Wake
Forest; Robert F. Phillips, Asheville; Mrs. R. J. Reynolds,
Winston-Salem; Mrs. Emil Rosenthal, Goldsboro; W. Cedric
Stallings, Charlotte
A. L. FLETCHER Chairman
R. FULLER MARTIN Director
MRS. FRANCES T. HILL Editor
Cover illustrations represent typical North Carolina
industries under the unemployment compensation
program.
Cover for Fall. 1945—Serving Travelers on Vacation or Busi-ness
—An Important State Industry. Illustration prepared
by Hemmer, N. C. State News Bureau. Such figures as are
available show that the travel industry is of the greatest
economic importance to North Carolina. It provides em-ployment
for thousands of persons and contributes millions
of dollars to the income of the state, both directly and in-directly.
In the years immediately preceding the war, the
travel industry had shown a phenomenal growth in North
Carolina. Prospects for its development in future years
indicate much greater expansion. This issue of the Quarterly
includes articles pointing out the economic possibilities of
travel, considered as an industry, and the allied business of
hotel services.
Sent free and upon request to responsible individuals, agencies,
organizations and libraries. Address: V. C. C. Informational
Service. Raleigh. N. C.
All material published in the U. C. C. Quarterly may be re-printed
without special permission.
CONTENTS
Common Sense Regarding Unemployment 86
Facts, Figures, and Policies 87
Purchasing Power and Unemployment 87
Unemployment Compensation By The States ._ 89
Veterans Create An Airline, By E. Carl Sink 90
Vocational Training For World War Veterans,
By J. Warren Smith ____ Ti_„l. 91
The Dogwood For Luck :z __.. 94
A Banker Appraises The South, By Robert
M. Hanes _____,,__„_,.___, 95
U. C. C. Chief Looks To "North Carolina's
Future '. 97
The Travel Industry __.:_.: .. 98
Tourism Is Big Business, By Felix A.
Grisette 99
Memo On Travel In North Carolina,
By Bill Sharpe 100
Tips As Wages 103
Suitable Work In The Post-war Period,
By Irene M. Zaccaro 104
The Law In Action, By Bruce Billings 108
Unemployment Benefits, By S. F. Teague 109
Notes On U. C. C. Operations 112
Keeping Up With Industrial Expansion
And Contraction 115
Honor Roll For Industry 119
THE LAW IN ACTION
With this issue of the Quarterly, we introduce a
new feature, to be carried regularly in future issues.
This is a section, under the heading of THE LAW
IN ACTION, in which our Senior Attorney, Mr.
Bruce Billings, discusses cases which have come be-fore
the Commission for decision and how various
aspects of the Unemployment Compensation Law
apply to them. His analysis shows the manner in
which the Commission's administrative practices
and policies work when particular sets of facts are
presented for consideration. Mr. Billings is a grad-uate
of the Duke University Law School. He has
been with the Unemployment Compensation Com-mission
since December 1937, and became Senior
Attorney in November 1944.
Editors note.
COMMON SENSE
REGARDING UNEMPLOYMENT
Plenty of common sense will be needed by both
management and labor during this reconversion
period from war to peacetime work.
We have already had many problem cases where
war workers have lost highly paid jobs and have
sought job insurance when they could not find em-ployment
that used their highest skill at wages re-ceived
in war work. During the period of readjust-ment
when living costs are still high, employers
should pay as high wages as are reasonably possible
under the conditions they must meet. Full employ-ment
cannot be maintained unless there is also full
purchasing power. All elements lose when national
purchasing power is reduced by lower earnings of
the workers.
On the other hand, there probably will not be
enough high-wage jobs, at least immediately, to go
around for all who have learned new and special
skills in war work. It now appears that the recon-version
is to be less drastic in North Carolina than it
may be elsewhere in the country, because of the
character of our major industries. However, there
will be many readjustments, and we expect many
workers to file claims for unemployment insurance
during the readjustment period before they become
re-employed. Most workers should accept the best
jobs that are available at the wage rates prevailing
in their communities. This will mean that some
will necessarily have to return to former occupa-tions,
even though their pay is less than earned in
war work.
It will be far better for most displaced workers to
accept reasonable wage offers rather than to depend
on the temporary job insurance provided by our law.
The highest weekly benefit is $20 a week—available
to workers who have earned $2,080.00 or more in
their base-period year. Our average payment for
total unemployment is now around $12.00 a week.
Almost any productive job should pay a good worker
better wages than he would be eligible to draw in
benefits.
The N. C. law requires a worker to be able and
available for work, in order to be eligible for unem-
FALL, 1945 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 87
ployment compensation. A refusal of an offer of
suitable work will disqualify a claimant. Each case
considered by the Commission on its individual
merits and with due regard to job opportunities and
to wage rates that prevail in the particular com-munity.
In many cases, however, it will be neces-sary
to consider a job offer as suitable work even
though the wages are less than the individual has
earned during the war years and even though the
offered work requires less skill than was required
in his former job.
FACTS. FIGURES. AND POLICIES
After two months of reconversion, questions arose
throughout the state as to the large number of un-filled
jobs and whether or not too many released war
workers might not be drawing unemployment bene-fits—
preferring loiter to labor.
An analysis of the situation at the end of Septem-ber
revealed a very different picture. Although some
16,000 war workers had been reported laid off in
North Carolina, less than 30 percent of them were
claiming unemployment checks. Presumably the
great majority had found re-employment quickly.
The Commission was then paying benefits to
7,010 unemployed workers, of whom 1,221 became
unemployed before the end of the war. Most of these
people were skilled workers, and four out of five of
them were women. Meanwhile, the employment
offices located throughout the state were listing a
total of 40,500 job openings. Hence the questions.
The Unemployment Compensation Commission
pays benefits to covered workers who lose their jobs
through no fault of their own. To be eligible for
benefits, a worker must register for work at an em-ployment
office and must be able, available and will-ing
to work. He is not eligible for benefits if he
refuses to accept suitable work.
If he quits work voluntarily, without good cause
attributable to the employer, or if he is discharged
for misconduct connected with his work, or if he re-fuses
to accept suitable work, the worker is disquali-fied
for benefits for periods ranging from a minimum
of four to a maximum of twelve weeks and his
earned benefit amount is reduced accordingly.
The Unemployment Compensation Commission of
North Carolina believes that the North Carolina
worker, who has worked in war plants in the state
and out, and who has acquired skills that he did not
have two or three years ago, ought to be given a
reasonable time within which to find a job calling
for that skill, or to have the Employment Service
find such a job for him.
During this time our Commission thinks that he
should draw benefits as provided by law. If it turns
out that no such work is available and if the worker
refuses to accept "suitable work", then benefits
should cease. Everything hinges on what consti-tutes
"suitable work". Obviously, work suitable for
one person may not be suitable for another. There
were 7,010 people drawing compensation benefits in
North Carolina, and scattered over the 100 counties
of the state according to U. S. Employment Service
figures, were 40,500 jobs—60 percent of these for
common labor.
Of the claimants, 5,475 were women. How many,
even of the less than 2,000 men, should be required to
accept pick and shovel jobs? The issue of suitable
work varies from claimant to claimant and every
claimant's case must be decided on its own merits.
There is one sure thing about North Carolina's
unemployment compensation which claimants are
quick to discover : None is going to get rich on the
benefits. In no case can a benefit exceed $20 a week.
That is the maximum and goes to a person with
earned credits of $2,080 or more in his benefit year
and who has been earning $40 or more per week.
North Carolina's schedule of payments provided
for benefits of approximately 50 percent of a
worker's weekly earnings. The duration of pay-ments
is up to sixteen weeks, or up to sixteen times
a benefit amount within a year, should the claimant
remain totally or partially unemployed. The only
exception to this applies to a veteran, who may be
entitled to draw checks for twenty weeks, or up to
twenty times his benefit amount, within a given
year.
In so far as the policy of the Agency is concerned,
it has undertaken to guard jealously the safety of
the fund against the unscrupulous attempt of any
who might prefer loiter to labor. To this end it goes
further than practically any other state by main-taining
in the field competent claims deputies with
judicial qualifications, competent to pass upon any
legal aspect which might affect the rights of the
claimant or the safety of the "fund from fraud".
A. L. F.
PURCHASING POWER
AND UNEMPLOYMENT
An increase in wages, aimed at an expansion of
purchasing power, is a fallacious policy to the extent
that such increase results in higher price levels and
increased living costs.
Everyone will agree that to have a high level of
employment there must be a high level of produc-tion;
and that a high level of production calls for a
high level of purchasing power, which in turn means
relatively high, but of greater importance relatively
uniform, wage levels.
That this uniformity is of prime importance can
be illustrated by a simple hypothesis. Assume a
working force of 48 million with wages which are
fairly adjusted to production and living costs. One-fourth
of these workers, engaged in producing con-sumer
goods, are able, through their bargaining
power to obtain wage increases which raise total
wage payments by 50 percent.
Since wages were originally adjusted to produc-tion
costs this increase in wages must be reflected in
increased prices of consumer goods, so that the 25
percent of the workers whose wages were increased
are able to buy no more with higher wages, than be-fore
the increase, while the other 75 percent can buy
much loss. Thus, the economic balance is immedi-ately
upset. Total consumer demand does not rise
PAGE 88 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY FALL, 1945
in proportion to the theoretical increase in purchas-ing
power. In volume, it is less because of the de-creased
purchasing power of 75 percent of the
workers. Production is reduced, unemployment fol-lows,
and increases in proportion to the disparity in
wages.
The single instance in which the income of only
one segment of the labor force can be raised without
disturbing the economic equilibrium is in the case of
farm products consumed in their raw state. When
farmers receive good prices for their products the
burden of the increase falls equally on all in propor-tion
to their consumption needs, without increasing
manufacturing costs and without regard to a high
or low wage level. At the same time it increases
the purchasing power of the large agricultural popu-lation
for manufactured goods, the increased pro-duction
of which means increased employment in
industry, trade and transportation.
One important group of economists holds that
there is a wage level—a low level—at which all labor
could be employed, and they contend that high wages
are responsible for unemployment, in that unemploy-ment
results from lack of capital, which in turn is
due to the presence of too high wage rates. This is
known as the capital scarcity theory, and apparently
is based on the assumption that low wages make for
more profits, and consequently more capital which
(they assume) will be invested in increased produc-tion.
The fallacy of this theory lies in the demonstrated
fact that low wages and greater profits lead to in-creased
dividends, and often, instead of reducing ad-ministrative
and executive salaries to correspond
with reduced wage levels, it is more apt to result in
an increase of the take-off by both administrators
and executives. In this case the purchasing power
of the masses is reduced without a corresponding
reduction in price levels. Even if it should make for
increased output, it provides the opportunity for
monopolistic production, which leads to adminis-tered
rather than to wholly competitive prices.
Under such conditions the large producer during
a cyclical decline merely holds approximately to his
old price levels, and curtails production, thereby in-creasing
unemployment, and diminishing purchas-ing
power. This places the small producer under a
severe handicap, if it does not force him out of busi-ness
; for hq must sell his products purely on a com-petitive
basis when decreased purchasing power
forces him to reduce his selling price, and at the
same time reduces his ability to purchase adminis-tered
price goods that go into his production.
Organized labor, of course, contends that unem-ployment
can be prevented by the payment of higher
wages, since purchasing power is thereby increased
and greater production made necessary. If the
present disparity in wage levels could be remedied,
and an increase in wages be made to apply uniformly
to all classes of wage earners this theory would hold
water to the extent that such increase could be ab-sorbed
in production costs without raising price
levels. Beyond that point wage increases would
fail to increase purchasing power, or reduce unem-ployment
for with every increase in wages a corre-sponding
increase in prices would follow.
On the other hand, if it be assumed that the prin-ciple
of labor organization is sound for one group it
must be admitted that it is good for all groups. If
that principle be carried to its logical conclusion and
the strength of all labor be used to force wages up
as high as its bargaining power would permit it,
would only create a vicious circle in which every in-crease
in wages would necessitate a raise in the price
structure. Purchasing power, therefore, would be
no greater at high than at low wage levels.
It should be patent to all that such an increase in
wages would make competition in world markets
impossible, and such competition is necessary be-cause
of our increasing productive capacity. It
would force a reduction in output, and an increase in
unemployment without placing the wage earner in
any better position than he occupied at a lower wage
level.
On the other hand, if lowering real wages could
increase production, and thereby employment, the
same result could be achieved through a monetary
policy which raises prices ; but, according to promi-nent
economists, the supply curve of labor is not a
function of real but of money wages, and such mone-tary
manipulations are calculated to frighten busi-ness
enterprise and discourage capital. This intro-duces
the question of whether and to what extent
government should undertake to control wages and
prices. For it must be admitted that with the decay
of the laissez-faire economy some wage-price con-trol
must be substituted for the unbridled power of
organized labor to raise wages on the one hand and
the monopolistic rule of the large-scale producer on
the other, before there can be a proper relation be-tween
wages and purchasing power.
Granting that increased purchasing power is the
remedy for unemployment, the two questions which
demand the prompt consideration of government and
economic experts are (1) Shall organized labor be
allowed to enforce its demands for higher and higher
wages, with no corresponding relief for the 40 mil-lion
unorganized workers? (2) Shall larger pro-ducers
be permitted to market their products under
an administered price policy which enables them to
hold prices up regardless of reduced production
costs, while the small producer must sell his products
on a competitive basis when his own purchasing
power is reduced through administered price con-trols?
These are not questions for the layman or the
amateur, but the very fact that there is disagree-ment
among leading economists, and between eco-nomists
and organized labor as to the effect of wages
and prices on unemployment points them up as the
No. 1 and 2 problems of our postwar economy.
It is apparent, however, even to a layman, that
you can't raise the income of 10 percent of the popu-lation
to the point of increasing living costs without
reducing the purchasing power of the other 90 per-cent
of the population, which in turn means reduced
production and increased unemployment. It is like-
FALL, 1945 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 89
wise apparent that an administered price control
that maintains high price levels with a lowering of
real wages will produce the same result, and that
these two factors working together contain the
potentialities of disaster for both industry and labor.
Silas F. Campbell.
Unemployment Compensation Progress—By the States
Critics of the federal-state program of unemploy-ment
compensation generally claim that the indi-vidual
states have not done enough to broaden the
provisions of their laws so that the protection offered
workers through this insurance system kept pace
with the times. This is the basis for various bills
introduced into Congress, from time to time, with
the approval, if not at the instigation of officials of
the Federal Government, aiming to liberalize the
program and make it nationally uniform.
However, unemployment is a local community
problem even more than it is a national one. The
worker's job is localized, and any national unem-ployment
problem cannot be solved unless regular
employment is provided in the home communities.
This is the nub of the demand for public employ-ment
services geared to operate in local situations.
Let's examine the record.
The Social Security Act of 1935 did not set up the
state system of unemployment insurance, although
it was designed to assist the states to provide their
own systems in conformity with certain minimum
standards. These levels, as suggested by the Social
Security Board included : (1) coverage of employers
of eight or more workers; (2) a maximum weekly
benefit of $15 ; and (3) a maximum duration of pay-ments
of not less than 12 weeks.
Starting from there, the states began immediately
to write their laws upward. Many of the original
state .laws were broader than conformity required.
Successive legislatures have continually liberalized
the state programs of unemployment compensation
in response to their local publics. At the close of
1945 legislative sessions the over-all picture is very
different from that ten years ago. It looks like this
:
COVERAGE
Of 51 state laws (inclusive of Hawaii and the
District of Columbia), or more than half now apply
to workers for smaller establishments than those
having eight or more employees. In 16 states, the
coverage is all-inclusive, and workers for employers
or one or more have unemployment insurance pro-tection.
WEEKLY BENEFIT AMOUNT
At the present time over 50 percent of the states
(27 out of 51) pay a maximum weekly benefit of $20
or more; 11 states have an $18 weekly maximum:
—
whereas originally only three states paid more than
$15 per week and their top figure was $16.
A significant aspect of these liberalized benefits is
that the 27 states paying a maximum of $20 or more
contain more than 77.5 percent of all covered
workers. Over 90 percent of all insured workers are
in the 38 states where a weekly maximum of $18 or
more applies.
BENEFIT DURATION
32 states now provide for the payment of benefits
up to 20 weeks or more, when the unemployed
worker does not find a job sooner. These 32 states
have over 79 percent of all covered workers.
NORTH CAROLINA
This state is grouped with the liberals in respect
to providing a maximum weekly benefit payment of
$20, but it lags behind the majority in coverage by
size of firm (still eight or more) as to the duration
of payments (16 weeks only).
The larger states, with the more liberal unemploy-ment
compensation laws, generally had the greatest
concentration of war-production contracts and
workers. Therefore, the more liberal state pro-visions
apply to even larger percentages of workers
displaced following the end of the war than has been
indicated above.
After a review of what the states, as a whole,
have done to improve the unemployment compensa-tion
program, the arguments in favor of federalizing
the system as a prerequisite to liberalizing it, grow
dim. The same groups who favor outright federali-zation
have suggested also, the enactment of federal
supplementary funds. Under any such plan, the
effect would be to coerce state legislatures and state
administrators into acceptance of the views of
federal officials.
The imposition of federal standards could retard
future state action in further strengthening their
own laws ; a direction in which they have made com-mendable
progress in the past few years.
As an example of state pioneering in the field of
extending insurance protection to another type of
unemployment than that which results from eco-nomic
disruption, there is the Rhode Island Cash
Sickness Compensation Act. Under this act, a trust
fund has been established from contributions by
workers. The Unemployment Compensation Board
which administers it, pays benefits to workers, ac-cording
to the same schedule in effect for unemploy-ment
compensation, but when the reason for the
unemployment and loss of wages is temporary sick-ness
or disability. Many other states have, and are
debating similar action.
A million casualties on battle fronts; thirty-six
million casualties on the home front. Such is the
National Safety Council's report of our country's
human tragedies between Pearl Harbor Day and
V-J Day. Of our total war casualties, the record
shows 261,608 killed; the home front accident score
lists 355,000 killed.
PAGE 90 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY FALL, 1945
Veterans Create an Airline
By E. Carl Sink
A bunch of the boys were talking it up in the
ready room of Consolidated-Vultee's test pilot's bar-racks.
The times between tests were getting longer
and longer ; the war was obviously coming to a close.
It was high time to talk of many things ; of how, for
example to make a living.
They all agreed that staying in the air was proper,
and, possibly, as profitable as other things a man
could do. When the talk got around to details, then
the boys split up into groups. There were four from
North Carolina, the Teague brothers, the fellow Fly
who's gotten into Ripley with his name and his job,
and Harris, big, rawboned, a wizard at the controls.
Earl Teague was for setting up an airline in his
home state, but all were dubious that the residue of
war wages would get the line going. Their argu-ments
came to a focus with the name of another
North Stater, R. B. Babbington, Jr., of Gastonia, in-surance
man and organizer, who agreed to look into
the possibilities.
He looked, and the boys got ready to go into busi-ness
as Southeast Airlines, Inc. First, they went
to the Army Surplus Board and got lined up on fly-ing
equipment, which turned out to be scouter
Cessnas which could be converted readily into cabin
cruisers, and had engines hardly more than broken
in by Army service. The war wages went in a hurry,
for airplanes come high at any time, but they figured
they were better off than the average guy, some of
whom hadn't even salvaged their own lives from the
war effort.
Next job was the converting of the ships into five-place,
four passenger transports which would not
only come within regulations as safe flying vehicles
but also furnish a maximum of comfort to passen-gers.
This was really a job for gentlemen who had
left such menial labor to the ground crews, but they
pitched in, and ended up with two good jobs, with
never a tremor in the cords nor a vibration in the
engines. With these they established the two-a-day,
criss-cross schedules which uncover all of North
Carolina in a day, and get you back home by bed-time.
The routes were flown, the airports landed on and
found safe, before the schedules ever saw print.
That's the way the boys planned it; they had the
Army idea of doing a thing right.
Three weeks and 26,000 flying miles after the
first ship went up on the first flight, the boys and
SEA were ready for the post-war world.
This writer, with a handy cameraman in the co-pilot
seat, climbed aboard on an October Tuesday and
headed East into a rising sun. Within an hour, he
was at the coast, at Carolina Beach, 150 miles from
Raleigh. Within minutes, in which he could have
had a dip or thrown 20 casts into the booming surf,
the schedule called for the trip back, and he was at
his desk again at 10 :20, one hour and twenty minutes
from desk to desk. But that wasn't all.
Not all, by a big margin, for the next leg and the
same ship took him over twenty towns (and they are
big towns, rich towns) straight through the heart
of the Piedmont, Raleigh to Durham to Greensboro
to Winston-Salem to Charlotte. But there's some-thing
else. That last leg of the flight took out from
Charlotte and winged right straight into the moun-tains
of western North Carolina. It was a thrill ride
from end to end, although the plane, flying on
stabilizer controls, moved steadily forward and up.
The ground below erupted into little mountains, big
mountains, and then monstrosities, which, even from
above, looked like stairs to Heaven. It is the grand-est
sight-seeing in America, those mountains of Car-olina.
Which is not bad from the viewpoint of the
boys of the Test Pilot Line.
For they have the best scenery in America to see
from an angle not yet covered, and they have short
hauls through the richest industrial section of the
They reconverted. While America talked of an airborne
world, R. B. Babbington, Jr., and U. L. Fly, shown here, and
associates started a strictly North Carolina airline.
The gigantic plant of Cannon Mills is a sight worth seeing
from the air at Kannapolis.
(Photos by State News Bureau)
FALL, 1945 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 91
Southeast. They have, too, arrangements with air-ports
whereby radio tells a plane overhead if passen-ger
business is there, which means smaller port bills,
since the business is arranged on a basis of rent for
landings made. These are important things, because
you don't start an airline on a shoestring. Compara-tively,
you start an airline on strings, shoes, suit, hat
and an allowance for about eight pairs of extra
drawers.
But, definitely, the air world has come to North
Carolina with the Test Pilot's Line. The boys have
put it on the line. What will happen may be a hint
as to the fate of air enthusiasms in the brave new
world.
Vocational Training for World War Veterans
By J. Warren Smith, Secretary, State Veteran's Education Committee
The problem of veteran's education is one of the
most important of our postwar projects. Our
government by congressional acts has made ample
provision for additional education or training varied
enough to be suitable for all veterans who are eligi-ble
and will ask for assistance. Provision for this
education is made possible by two laws. Public Law
#16 provides education and training of war service
connected handicapped veterans, and Public Law
#346 makes provisions for education and training
for veterans without physical handicap. The latter
law is commonly referred to as the G.I.Bill of Rights.
This article will be limited to the below college
level vocational training of veterans or for those for
which the principal need is for educational oppor-tunities
of less than collegiate type. By data se-cured
from those now returned, we know that the
group who want vocational training will be much
larger than the group who will want college educa-tion.
Very little attention has been given to the
vocational group by the writers of the articles that
have appeared in our periodicals. Therefore, the
public seems to have a much clearer conception of
the provisions and the mechanics of securing educa-tion
as provided by colleges. For those eligible it is
important that young men who had their plans in-terrupted
by the war take advantage of the oppor-tunity
afforded them to complete their college edu-cation;
however, for those not eligible for college,
every effort should be made to furnish for them a
type of education best suited to their needs. For
many this will be school vocational training or on-the-
job training furnished by industry.
HOW MANY TO BE TRAINED
For all types of military service men and women,
white and Negro, 350,000 persons have been in-ducted
into service from North Carolina; 82%, or
287,000, will return to North Carolina. According
to estimates made by E. V. Hollis from the U. S.
Office of Education, 31/2 million of the 15 million in-ducted
from the United States (at that time) would
want some form of education. Two-thirds of this
number, or 2^3 million, will want some form of voca-tional
training. By applying the same ratio to the
number returning in North Carolina, we will be
faced with the problem of providing some form of
vocational training to 45,000 returned veterans.
More recent data than that furnished by Dr. Hollis
has proved that his estimates were too high, how-ever,
we do know that our problem is too large for
the facilities we have to furnish the training.
PHYSICALLY HANDICAPPED VETERANS
Ample provision for education or training of the
service-connected physically handicapped veteran
has been made by Public Law #16. The personnel
of the Veteran's Administration are responsible for
carrying out the provisions of this law. Every effort
must be made to make possible for a veteran who,
because of his disability, cannot continue in his
former occupation, to be trained in a new occupation
equivalent in rank and earnings to his former job.
The matter of hospitalization or physical restora-tion
for the veteran needing this type of service is
taken care of by the government before his release
to civilian status. After eligibility for training has
been established the veteran is referred to a counsel-ing
bureau for guidance. At this time the veteran's
bureau has four bureaus well staffed with experts.
The four centers are Chapel Hill, Fayetteville, Salis-bury
and Asheville. By special tests and counseling
an intelligent approach is made to the selection of a
new occupation. After the selection has been made
a veteran's training supervisor places the veteran in
a training situation. These supervisors complete all
the necessary arrangements, including an agreement
or contract with the training agency. For this public
law, prior approval by the State Veteran's Education
Committee is not necessary.
Veterans of World War II with handicaps may be
served by the Department of Vocational Rehabilita-tion,
operated by the State Department of Public
Instruction. Although the vocational rehabilitation
of civilians and veterans are provided for in separate
acts, veterans may be accepted in the civilian pro-gram,
either because the Veterans Administration
may judge that the disability is not a service-con-nected
one and therefore not covered by Public Law
#16, or if the veteran wants to elect voluntarily to
be served by the civilian program. The main point
for the veteran to know is that our government has
provided amply for his welfare. He should be en-couraged
to avail himself of the opportunities that
are his.
REGULATIONS FOR EDUCATION OR TRAIN-ING
OF VETERANS—PUBLIC LAW 346
For regulations concerning education or training
of veterans, I am inserting a quotation from Colonel
Hines. 1 This statement is easier to interpret than
the law itself.
"The Administrator of Veterans' Affairs stated on
60 Monthly Labor Review 1222 (June 1945).
PAGE 92 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY FALL, 1945
January 18, 1945, that under the Servicemen's Re-adjustment
Act of 1944, any veteran of World War
II is entitled to education or training (or a refresher
or retraining course) in an approved educational or
training institution for a period of 1 year, or for
such lesser time as may be required for the course of
instruction chosen by him. To qualify for such edu-cation
or training, the applicant must have (1) been
in active service on or after September 16, 1940, and
prior to the termination of the present war, (2) been
discharged or released "under conditions other than
dishonorable," (3) served 90 days or more, exclusive
of assigned education or training periods or (if less
than 90 days' service) been released from actual
service by reason of a service-incurred injury or
disability, and (4) must make application for and
initiate the course of education or training within
two years following discharge or release from active
service, or from the date of termination of the war,
whichever is later.
Eligibility for Education or Training Beyond One
Year.—In order to be entitled to education or train-ing
other than a refresher or retraining course be-yond
one year, satisfactory completion of such
course according to regularly prescribed standards
and practices of the institution is required.
Further it must be shown that the person's edu-cation
or training was impeded, delayed, inter-rupted,
or interfered with by reason of his entrance
into service. Such conditions are assumed as exist-ing
in the case of the person who was not more than
25 years of age at the time he entered active service
(or September 16, 1940, whichever is the later) but
must be proved by persons over 25 years of age at
the time above specified.
Veteran learning to be auto mechanic by on-the-job method.
Payment of Expenses of Veterans.—The regula-tions
issued by the Administrator make provision
for subsistence allowance and the payment of author-ized
expenses incurred by the veteran in his educa-tion
or training under the Servicemen's Readjust-ment
Act of 1944. Under this measure, expenses of
the veteran—if he is in an educational institution
—
that will be defrayed by the Government include the
"customary cost of tuition, laboratory, library,
health, infirmary, and other similar fees as are
customarily charged, and other necessary expenses
* * * as are generally required for the successful
pursuit and completion by other students in the
institution * * * or those charges which have been
approved by the Administrator of Veterans' Affairs.
Board, lodging, and other living expenses and travel
are not to be included." The Government also meets
the charges for "books, supplies, equipment, and
other necessary expenses customarily incurred for
or by any student."
If the eligible discharged serviceman selects some
type of institution other than one of an educational
character, expenses defrayed by the Government in-clude
"the charges for supplies, and other necessary
equipment customarily furnished other persons be-ing
trained by the establishment in the given trade
or position."
Full-time subsistence allowances are $50.00 per
month for men without dependents, and $75.00 per
month for those having dependents. If the veteran
is not taking a full-time course, subsistence is
measured in fractions of three-fourths, one-half, and
one-fourth of the above amount according to the
fraction that his course is of a full course. No such
allowance is to be paid when the payment is barred
because the veteran is engaged in full-time gainful
employment in a part of his course of education or
training.
When the veteran is receiving compensation for
productive labor performed as part of his appren-ticeship
or other training on the job, the amount of
subsistence plus his current monthly salary or wage
(based on the standard workweek exclusive of over-time)
shall not exceed the standard beginning
salary or wage (similarly based) payable to a
journeyman in the trade or occupation in which
training is being given."
From the above quotation we offer the following
interpretations
:
1. Refresher or retraining courses which may be
apprenticeship or on-the-job training, are open to
any honorably discharged veterans with the required
period of active service on request.
2. Veterans older than 25 at time of induction
must prove training was interrupted in order to be
eligible for more than one year of training.
3. Veterans entering upon on-the-job training
requiring less than a year to reach their objective
are eligible for subsistence for only the length of the
training period.
4. Veterans who were under 25 years of age at
the time of induction may serve a full apprenticeship
if they are making satisfactory progress at the end
FALL, 1945 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 93
of first year and have a service record long enough
to be eligible for the full period of apprenticeship.
5. Veterans in training by apprenticeship or
on-the-job training plan are eligible to be furnished
by the veterans administration supplies and other
necessary hand tools customarily furnished to other
persons being trained in peacetime.
6. It is up to the veteran, he must make his own
application for the type of education or training he
desires.
SCHOOL OR BUSINESS
APPROVED FOR TRAINING
The matter of approving schools or other institu-tions
for training rests with the different states.
Governor Broughton designated the State Depart-ment
of Public Instruction as the approval agency.
Dr. Erwin appointed from this department a com-mittee
of six, known as State Veterans' Education
Committee. The committee members are: Dr.
James E. Hillman, Chairman; J. Warren Smith,
Secretary ; Dr. J. Henry Highsmith ; Dr. N. C. New-bold;
Charles H. Warren; and C. L. Beddingfield.
This committee is charged with the responsibility
of deciding whether or not a school or other insti-tution
should be approved to participate in the
veteran's educational program. This applies to col-leges
(public or private), business schools, trade or
technical schools (public or private), and other in-stitutions
such as banks, stores, manufacturing com-panies,
garages, business or industrial concerns.
A school or business seeking approval must file an
application and include a written plan of training;
after the application and plan of training has been
received a member of the committee makes a per-sonal
inspection of the plant, then for final action
each application is reviewed by the whole committee.
If approval is given, the company or school and the
Veterans' Administration are notified.
This committee feels keenly the responsibility of
trying to be certain that the money involved will be
spent wisely and that the veteran will receive an
equitable return for his time and effort. The com-mittee
knows that it must be on the alert for appli-cations
from private schools designed to make ex-cessive
profit without rendering adequate service to
the veteran, and for industries who are not sincere
about training.
To date nearly all of our A grade colleges, a large
number of business schools, several private trade
schools, and several hundred industrial establish-ments
have been approved for training.
As the need becomes more urgent special voca-tional
public school shops will be operated for
veterans to provide short intensive training pro-grams
in subjects such as electric motor repair,
radio and electric appliance repair, general welding,
machine shop practice, automobile mechanics and
drafting.
Since the offerings in our public schools are
limited and we do not have any State Trade Schools
or private vocational or technical schools, it is im-portant
that we make optimum use of the on-the-job
or apprenticeship plan. By this plan, the number of
our places of training is limited only to the fitness of
Veteran learning to be motor repair mechanic by on-the-job
method.
the place and the willingness of the personnel of the
industry to cooperate.
APPRENTICESHIP OR
ON-THE-JOB TRAINING
If well organized, the apprenticeship or on-the-job
plan affords the best possible method to learn a
trade. For many of the skilled trades and all of the
semi-skilled occupations there is not any better place
to learn the necessary skills than on the job in the
industry. By this method the veteran will be learn-ing
under actual working conditions in the environ-ment
of the trade itself. He will be instructed on
real jobs, jobs that must be finished well enough to
be accepted by the trade. He will have as instructors
men accepted as skilled craftsmen and considered
expert. These instructors, because of their positions
in the commercial trade, will be up-to-date in the
newest developments and practical working knowl-edge
of the trade. The veteran will have the ad-vantage
of learning in a shop well equipped with
up-to-date machinery and tools, and the necessary
supplies.
The veteran, in addition to the skills, must learn
to work with others, and learn the rules of industry,
proper work habits and attitudes—these too can best
be learned in industry itself.
SUPPLEMENTARY TRAINING
On-the-job training should be supplemented by
organized class instruction. The complete learning
of a job includes manipulative skills, science, draw-ing,
math, industrial knowledge, safety and morale.
The manipulative features are learned easiest on the
job. All other features can also be learned that
PAGE 94 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY FALL, 1945
way; however, the learning process can be speeded
up by organized class instruction. This is particu-larly
true for the related technical information. For
example, the theory of the operation of a carburetor,
what makes a battery charge, or what makes a motor
run. For any group of veterans learning by on-the-job
method, the local school administrator, with the
assistance and cooperation of the Department of
Industrial Education of the State Department of
Public Instruction, will organize and operate, free of
charge, supplementary classes for any industrial
trade.
DIFFERENCE BETWEEN
JOB AND TRAINING
There is a difference between having a work job
in industry and being in training, and a large num-ber
of industries make little effort at organized
training. The worker in an industry that gives
little attention to training after acquiring an
initial skill is too often kept performing this opera-tion
for an indefinite length of time, thus he is denied
the opportunity to learn the various operations
necessary to his trade. It is the responsibility of the
committee mentioned above to determine whether it
is training or just a job the veteran will be getting
if the place of business is approved.
Training of veterans by on-the-job method will be
most apt to be successful if the following conditions
are met
:
1. The company personnel is sincere in its desire to really
train veterans.
2. A written statement of the training plan has been pre-pared
and all parties concerned with training understand
and agree to it.
3. The written statement includes a schedule of the opera-tions
to be learned, with the approximate amount of time
necessary for learning each step.
4. There is a schedule of pay with regular increases as the
learner progresses.
5. An attempt will be made to select veterans with aptitude
and interest for the different trades to be learned.
6. Skilled men with instructional ability will be designated
as instructors. It will be the duty of these instructors to
guide these veterans in their learning. They should by
telling how and by demonstration make learning easy for
these veterans.
Managers of industry in North Carolina can, if
they will, make it possible for a large number of
veterans to get excellent training in the trade of
their choice. Let's give those men the opportunity
they so justly deserve.
THE DOGWOOD FOR LUCK
HHii
Turned a Handcraft Into a Business. Stuart Nye, Asheville
War I Veteran, shown instructing an employee. Working out
simple jewelry designs, he teaches women to do the production.
Veterans of World War II who are wondering
how to recognize Dame Opportunity when they take
up civilian pursuits might be interested in the ex-perience
of Stuart Nye, veteran of World War I.
Lady Luck wears various visages, but she ap-peared
to Nye, at that time a patient in the veterans
hospital at Oteen, as a disgruntled hobbyist figura-tively
wearing a dogwood blossom. This improbable
combination threw Nye into a silversmithing busi-ness
which has risen from a $500 per year gross
enterprise into a thriving business with an annual
payroll alone of over $30,000.
Nye, while convalescing, had dabbled indifferently
with woodworking, and then one day a fellow-patient,
leaving the place, offered to sell him his
metal-working tools. Nye reluctantly bought the
stuff, and began tinkering with silver, later launch-ing
his novelty-jewelry business.
He did only moderately well until one day he
fashioned his first dogwood blossom. Instantly, the
new design caught on, and every week since then the
business has steadily increased. Pins, rings, brace-lets
and other ornaments featuring the delicate
petals became and continue a fad. Nye also worked
out pine cones, pansies and other designs, and today
his products are sold in every state and in many
foreign countries.
Nye, a pleasant, placid person, says he is as sur-prised
as anyone at the success of his business. He
scoffs at the notion that he is a creative genius. "I
made a discovery," he says. "Or rather, just in-vented
an idea. There's nothing to it—everybody's
making dogwood now."
Nevertheless, Nye's designs are widely sought
under his name and he seems not to have suffered
from competition. His production formula has been
FALL, 1945 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 95
Starting alone a few years ago, Nye now employs 30 girls who
are kept busy trying to meet demands for the silver ornaments.
All his employees learn the trade in the shop and Nye insists
it's "simple". (Photos by State News Bureau)
unchanged from the beginning. He produces only
pieces from his own original designs, and he refuses
to speed up production by introduction of machinery.
Each piece must be cut, filed, finished by hand.
Housed in a bright little workshop in his back-yard,
his workers are mostly young girls, all of them
3^ trained in the shop itself. "It's easy," Nye insists
casually. "A girl starts some simple operation, like
filing, and soon picks it up. Of course, some are
better than others."
As to the magical properties of dogwood which
he firmly believes started him on success, he has no
particular theory. "It's pretty," he says simply.
A BANKER APPRAISES THE SOUTH
(By Robert M. Hanes, of Winston-Salem, N. C, president of the Reserve City Bankers Association,
EXTRACTS FROM AN ADDRESS BEFORE A MEETING OF BUSINESS EXECUTIVES IN NEW YORK.)
No region in the nation has had such a wide
divergence of interpretation as has the South.
It has been called America's economic problem No.
1. In film and fiction it has been depicted as an area
inhabited by barefoot, pellagra ridden share crop-pers,
a land eroded by one crop farming, a section
where low wages and sub-standard educational and
living conditions prevail.
Other interpreters of the South ignore its handi-caps
and picture it as a land of golden promise with
a rich and easy harvest. They wax eloquent against
a background of mint juleps, soft flowing streams
and Stephen Foster sentiment. They, too, lack a
sense of realism.
I shall attempt here to evaluate, in terms of busi-ness
outlook, the South's problems and its opportuni-ties;
in other words, to make a banker's appraisal
of the South.
On the credit side, the South has an abundant
supply of many raw materials—cotton, tobacco,
timber, petroleum, coal, iron, natural gas, minerals,
naval stores, and a wide variety of other products.
Of the country's total production, the South ac-counts
for 95% of the cotton, 90% of the tobacco,
75% of the natural gas, 60% of the crude petroleum,
50 % of the bituminous coal, 40 % of the lumber, and
12% of the iron ore.
Turning these raw materials into finished products
has been the basis of the South's industrial progress
for decades.
While at times this progress may have seemed
somewhat slow, when we review the gains over a
period of years the figures provide some sense of
satisfaction. At the turn of the century in 1900,
total industrial production in the South was valued
at $1,564,000,000. For 1939, the last year for which
data from the Bureau of Census are available, this
figure had increased to $11,190,000,000, a gain
slightly in excess of 700%. During the same period,
the national gain was 400 %>, while states outside the
South increased 366%.
Today, 80% of the active cotton spindles are in
Southern mills and we manufacture 90% of the
nation's tobacco products.
Electric power development in the South has con-tributed
substantially to its industrial growth. In
1943, we produced 26% of all the electric power out-put
in the country, including both water power and
power from fuels.
In 1943 the South accounted for 40% of the
national farm crop income.
In 1900 the South's cotton crop brought $370,-
000,000; in 1943, $1,322,000,000. Our tobacco crop
of 1900 sold for $40,000,000 ; in 1943, $514,000,000.
Of special significance is the South's financial pro-gress.
In 1910 the banking resources of this region
were only $3,275,000,000 ; today they are more than
$23,000,000,000. Savings deposits in the same period
have increased from $575,000,000 to $3,500,000,000.
Life insurance in force increased from 3!/2 billions
to more than 30 billions.
One of the South's leading natural advantages is
its climate. It is a land of mild temperatures,
relatively free from extremes of heat and cold, with
ample rainfall and an abundance of sunshine
throughout the year. This provides a long growing
season for agriculture and attracts workers and
others who seek relief from the rigors of harsher
climates in other regions.
The South's white population is composed largely
of native-born stock, direct descendants of the early
independent, pioneer settlers, almost wholly pure
Anglo-Saxon.
It is a homogenous population. It is predomi-nately
rural and therefore possesses those inbred
characteristics of stability and resourcefulness so
valuable in the development of industrial enter-prises.
Although not highly skilled, it has been con-clusively
demonstrated that Southern labor can
readily be taught skilled trades.
Our people are not crowded together in large
cities, but scattered in smaller cities and towns
PAGE 96 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY FALL, 1945
where living and working conditions are more at-tractive.
The South has few metropolitan cities ; it
has thousands of small towns whose people are sup-ported
partly by industry and trade, and partly by
agriculture. This pattern fits perfectly into the
current trend of dispersal of large industries.
The South has excellent transportation facilities.
Today 81,473 miles of railway lines crisscross the
Southern states. We pioneered in the development
of concrete highways, and now approximately
350,000 miles of modern highways spread through-out
the South. Twenty-one airlines serve this re-gion
and supply direct connections with other routes
throughout the nation and overseas. Through our
excellent ports and harbors and our inland water-ways
flows a steady stream of domestic and foreign
commerce.
Now let's look at the debit side—some of the
South's problems and needs.
We have relied too much on one crop—cotton—in
our agriculture and have not had sufficient diversi-fication
in industry. Too much reliance on the grow-ing
of cotton and tobacco and the processing of these
raw materials has made us too vulnerable to sudden
market changes affecting these products. The result
has been that farmers in normal times have had to
sell much of their cotton and tobacco in an unpro-tected
world market and buy much of their food,
machinery and clothing in a well protected domestic
market.
The freight rate structure, which for many years
favored producers in the East at the expense of
Southern producers and shippers, has undoubtedly
greatly retarded the South's development.
Nothing has happened in the past 50 years of such
tremendous significance as the recent decision of the
Interstate Commerce Commission to correct those
freight rate inequities. The beneficial results will
not appear immediately, but in the next five to ten
years this change in freight rates will greatly stimu-late
Southern progress.
It will mean that the nation's great distributing
and merchandising companies will establish more
distribution centers throughout the South, and
finished products from Southern plants will move to
markets throughout the nation on an equal basis
with products from other sections of the country.
The trend towards the South, which has been evident
now for some years, will be greatly accelerated by
this momentous decision.
The South has not produced enough foodstuffs and
clothing to supply the needs of its own region, thus
necessitating the more expensive procedure of bring-ing
in these basic supplies from distant sources.
If the South is to provide a broader market for its
own products, it must continue to raise the average
per capita income of its people.
To meet the challenge of the future, I believe we
shall need more business and industrial leadership,
constantly improving management, to help develop
our resources and opportunities.
We also need many more technically trained men.
We have produced our share of leaders and tech-nicians,
but many of them were so good that they
were lured away to responsible positions in other
sections of the country. We must provide full op-portunity
for our own young men and also import
leadership from other sections to broaden our busi-ness
viewpoint and add new types of experience.
These are some of our problems and needs. There
are others, but I believe that most of them are re-lated
to these main points.
Recently there have been unmistakable trends and
developments which give an entirely new color to
the picture of the South, factors which can greatly
accelerate its progress.
The impact of war upon the South is of particular
significance.
In the four years ending June 30, 1944, $5,187,-
000,000 had been spent in Southern states for war
production facilities alone—plants, shipyards, tools,
etc. This does not include other billions spent for
airports, camps, and purely military. installations.
WAR CONTRACTS
During the same period war supply contracts
awarded in the South totaled $25,532,402,000. They
included ships, plans, guns, shells, ammunition, ex-plosives,
high-octane gasoline, textiles, synthetic
rubber, food, paper and pulp, steel, aluminum and
cement, to name some of the more important items.
There has been a substantial accumulation of re-serves,
savings, and war bonds by industry, business
and individuals throughout the South.
The intensified need for foods and raw materials
has forced improved methods, diversification and in-tensive
cultivation in agriculture.
Farm mortgage debt has been greatly reduced, the
use of more farm machinery has been stimulated and
the farmer has been obliged to learn new techniques
and better farm management.
Farming in the South is rapidly getting away
from the one cash crop system and in the future we
shall produce more of our own foodstuffs, especially
poultry, eggs and a wide variety of dairy products.
The war production program has brought new and
diversified industry to the South, developing a large
supply of skilled labor. This has been one of our
great needs—the training of labor in high precision
work.
In the textile field the South once had the reputa-tion
for producing largely coarse goods and low
quality products. This picture has changed ma-terially
in recent years as many refinements and im-provements
have been made in our textile industry.
For example, we have one producer in North
Carolina making fine combed yarn with counts as
high as 160, which is probably the finest yarn made
in this country.
Many of our mills are already placing orders for
improved machinery and equipment when available.
There is a substantial program now under way for
the expansion and improvement of rayon weaving
facilities and the enlargement and refinement of
spun rayon production. There is also taking place
FALL, 1945 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 97
an expansion of woolen yarn and woolen fabric pro-duction.
In furniture manufacturing we have many plants
turning out high quality furniture products, and we
have demonstrated that these products will compete
in durability and appearance with high grade furni-ture
made in any other section of the country.
The paper and pulp industry is moving South
where it has been attracted by huge supplies of raw
materials and favorable working conditions. In
1943 we produced 47% of the nation's wood pulp and
26% of its paper and paperboard. While much of
this production is in the coarser paper goods made
from our pine forests, other types of paper mills are
being developed in the South. We have a notable
example of this in the Ecusta Paper Corporation in
North Carolina which now supplies nearly all of the
cigarette paper for the nation and in addition makes
high grade writing papers.
There has been a tremendous shifting of the
hosiery industry to the South. In the past 10 or 15
years many plants from the middle Atlantic belt
have moved into the South, and there has been a
dramatic development of new plants within the area,
many of which started with two to five knitting
machines.
The South is rapidly overcoming its handicap in
education, research and technical training. For ex-ample,
in 1910 the South spent $80,000,000 for
public schools. In 1943 it spent $511,000,000. There
is much yet to be accomplished, but we are making
rapid progress in raising our educational standards.
Of special interest to industry is the establishment
of excellent facilities for the technical training of
young men to operate and manage industrial plants.
There are now being established at the North Caro-lina
State College of Agriculture and Engineering,
three foundations—the Textile, the Dairy and the
Agricultural Foundations—Which will do much to
broaden our technical training.
In the field of research we are also making out-standing
progress.
There will be ample bank credit available to meet
all sound industrial credit needs in the South during
the reconversion period. We have in recent years
developed many sizeable regional banks which work
closely with local community banks, thus providing,
through correspondent relationships, a combination
of financial resources adequate for all needs.
As a special aid to small business, credit groups
are being formed throughout the country under the
leadership of the American Bankers Association.
The combined credit being offered by groups already
formed in the South totals over $250,000,000 and the
amount is being continually increased.
Summarizing this appraisal, the South has made
great progress. We still have far to go to equal the
economic attainments of some other regions, but I
venture to predict that the rate of progress in the
South during the next decade will equal or surpass
that of any other section. I, therefore, leave with
you the slogan of one of our great southern rail-roads,
"Look Ahead—Look South!"
U.C. C. CHIEF LOOKS TO
NORTH CAROLINA'S FUTURE
A newspaper man asked me not so long ago what
was going to happen in North Carolina during re-conversion.
I answered that in so far as North
Carolina's textile, tobacco, hosiery and furniture in-dustries
are concerned, any displacement of labor
would be temporary and that steady employment
over a long period of time is fairly certain. Recon-version
to goods for civilian use, of which there is a
distressing shortage throughout the world, will take
only a few days for our textile plants. Tobacco,
furniture and wood-working plants generally have
no problems at all. If the old world can be kept on
an even keel, North Carolina will be all right.
In the matter of establishments that may be classi-fied
as 100 percent war plants, we experienced the
effects of mass lay-offs. About 16,000 people were
laid off in North Carolina after the announcement
of the end of the Japanese War. Most of these
people have found jobs among us somewhere, and it
is my hope that North Carolina industry can absorb
the rest of them.
But as has been pointed out, industry should not
be called upon to absorb all ex-war workers, includ-ing
boys and girls of high school age; housewives
who had never worked before and should now go
back to home-making and many older workers who
were called back to machine and work bench for the
emergency and who should now take retirement.
In every community where one of the war plants
mushroomed into vast proportions over-night and
collapsed just as suddenly, there is considerable fear
and uncertainty. In over a dozen North Carolina
communities great factories, filled with expensive
machinery, stand idle. There is no sign of life
around them, except for passing watchmen or care-takers.
One Of the biggest of these plants, with over
7,000 workers a few weeks ago, has three people in
the office, three watchmen and six mechanics.
What to do with these great plants is a problem.
Left vacant, everybody knows what will happen. In
a year, stones from the hands and sling-shots of
boys will have smashed most of the windows and the
fine buildings will be the haunts of rats and bats.
It seems to me that our Department of Conser-vation
and Development and our State Planning
Board ought to be thinking and planning to make
use of these buildings and of as much of their
machinery as can be used for peace-time production.
I think we should encourage the establishment of
small shops, manufacturing the tools and gadgets
that North Carolina buys in such huge quantities.
One of these huge war plants might easily be con-verted
into 20 or more such small establishments,
all offering gainful employment to skilled mechanics
and profitable enterprises for men of business and
executive ability.
Let's not wait for "Big Business" from the out-side
to come in and take over these big plants. Let's
take them over ourselves for the establishment of a
vast number of small industries so badly needed
right now.
A. L. Fletcher.
PAGE 98 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY FALL, 1945
THE TRAVEL INDUSTRY
Before the war, travel ranked high among the
major industries of the United States. The vacation
and business travel dollar had become an important
factor in state and national economy. But the
travel industry became a war casualty, with the
many restrictions that were necessary. However,
vacation travel is now due for a boom. In fact this
has already started, with more people planning to
go farther afield, to spend more money and to take
more time, or more frequent vacation and business
trips.
To arrive at some measure of the relative im-portance
of the travel industry to North Carolina,
one has to refer to pre-war figures. Looking back
to the year 1938, it appears that tourist travel in
North Carolina yielded $64,350,000, according to a
National Park Service report. This is a dollar crop
of more than $5,000,000 a month—double the value
of the cotton crop and over one-third the value of the
tobacco crop.
Everyone in North Carolina benefited from this
money as it went into immediate circulation through
filling stations, restaurants, hotels, tourist homes,
merchants, and other trade channels. If such a sum
as $64 millions could have been set aside in a special
fund, it would have operated the schools in the state
for more than two years. There would have been
more than enough to operate all state governmental
activities, including schools, institutions and depart-ments
for one year and still leave a balance of $25
millions.
The accepted standard for estimating tourist
travel showed that at least 1,750,000 persons spent
an average of $6.00 per day in North Carolina in
1939. Supposing one-half of this was spent at buy-ing
at retail, a conservative estimate, approximately
$1,000,000 went into the state general fund from
sales taxes alone.
Immediately prior to the war, the state's travel
industry was increasing rapidly. This is evidenced
by the fact that in 1941, there was an increase in
gasoline tax revenue of 39.8 percent, over the year
1937, although the national increase in gasoline con-sumption
during the same period was listed as 14.6
percent. North Carolina collected $8,655,696 more
in gasoline taxes in 1941 than it did in 1937. The
difference between what the state would have col-lected
on a national average and what it actually
netted—nearly $6,000,000—must be credited to the
larger increase in travel in North Carolina.
Similar indicators are found in the increase in
non-resident hunting and fishing licenses, and in the
recorded number of visitors to national park and
forest areas. Between 1937 and 1941, out-of-state
hunting and fishing licenses rose 85 percent. In
1937 there were 727,243 visitors to the Great Smoky
Mountains National Park, but in 1941 there were
1,247,919; while visitors to the Pisgah and Nanta-hala
Forests increased 600 and 280 percent re-spectively.
HOTELS
In spite of the war's restrictions on travel gen-erally,
the state's hotel business did not suffer
materially during the war. Many of the larger re-sort
hotels were taken over and operated by the
Federal Government for the quartering of military
and diplomatic personnel; and a relatively small
number of the seasonal resorts located in out of the
way places were forced to close. Most of the hotels
in North Carolina, however, have been crowded to
capacity throughout the war years. With the large
number of Army and Marine camps located in the
state, servicemen on furlough and their visiting
families more than filled available accommodations.
Most communities, in fact, were called upon through
U. S. O. offices to furnish lodgings in private homes
when the hotels just could not take any more guests.
This situation is reflected in the reports on em-ployment
made to the Unemployment Compensation
Commission. In 1941, there were 134 hotel estab-lishments,
operating with eight or more workers for
at least 20 weeks in the year, reporting an average
total employment of 4,033 persons. In the first year
of the war, only 115 hotels reported 3,795 employed
in various services. But by 1944, with no resort
hotels reporting to the Commission, the number of
establishments filing returns had increased to 141,
and their employees to 4,875. These people received
in wages a total of $4,471,901.00 last year.
Taken altogether, these facts amply bear out the
statement of a leading North Carolina editor : "The
travel industry of North Carolina is of the utmost
economic importance. It provides employment for
thousands of persons. It directly determines the
prosperity of many Tar Heel communities. It con-tributes
substantially to the support of the state and
local governments."
Bringing in the baggage—here we have a "Bell-hoppess".
FALL, 1945 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 99
Tourism is Big Business
By Felix A. Grisette, Managing Director North Carolina State Planning Board
The tourist industry is big business.
Competent students of the industry estimate that
it offers a potential yield of $150,000,000 annually in
North Carolina. The magnitude of this income can
best be appreciated by remembering that the com-bined
cash receipts from all livestock and livestock
products in North Carolina during 1944 was only
$107,000,000, or that the total value of all sales of
the North Carolina cotton crop was less than $85,-
000,000.
There are two widespread fallacies about the travel
business which should be corrected in the public
mind. One is that the cash income derived from
tourists is limited to a very few agencies, such as
hotels, restaurants, and filling stations. The other
is that the whole business is thought of in terms of
a pastime or as an appendage to some pleasure
rather than as an industry in itself.
It should not require any considerable knowledge
of economics to realize that any such sum as $150,-
000,000 annually, when turned loose in a state, will
benefit far more people than any very few businesses.
This money will be equally as valuable to the entire
economy of all the people as any other industry with
an equal volume of revenue. With an adequate pro-gram
of overall state promotion, the entire State
can benefit from this volume of travel business. Gen-erally
speaking, travelers on vacation do not go to
any one specific point, but to a section or region.
There is every reason to assume that the visitor
going to the mountains can also be persuaded to
visit the sandhills and the coastal areas. Obviously,
while going from one point to the other within the
State, the traveler leaves his expenditures all along
the way.
Clearly, an industry with such possibilities should
not be thought of in terms of play.
It is equally clear that any industry holding forth
such possibilities will be the object of keen compe-tition
between different states and sections of the
country. North Carolina must be prepared to obtain
its fair share of this business.
The State Planning Board, in line with its policy
of recommending courses of action in terms of the
needs of the people, more than a year ago asked
ex-Governor J. Melville Broughton to appoint a
Tourist-Travel Committee to advise with the Board
and to coordinate the efforts of all interests con-cerned
with travel. The following persons were
appointed
:
Coleman W. Roberts, Chairman
Thomas H. Briggs D. Hiden Ramsey
H. S. Gibbs Charles E. Ray, Jr.
Felix A. Grisette, Ex-offi- Bill Sharpe
cio, Secretary Richard S. Tufts
Robert I. Lee Lionel Weil
J. B. McCoy
As the committee studied the situation, it became
increasingly obvious that a state-wide, non-govern-mental
agency should be created to work with the
Department of Conservation and Development and
others concerned. Accordingly, the establishment
of an organization to be known as the North Carolina
Travel Council was recommended. This recommen-dation
received favorable reactions from all inter-ests
directly concerned with the travel industry,
with the result that plans are now under way for
completing the organization of the Council.
As now proposed, the Council shall be an organi-zation
of those agencies serving the traveling pub-lic
in the State of North Carolina, and shall be de-voted
to the improvement and development of all
phases of the industry within the State.
The Council shall represent the best interests of
its members in all matters pertaining to the welfare
of the travel industry as a whole and shall, through
exchange of information, educational campaigns and
by other means endeavor to improve the services of-fered
to the traveling public by the industry, and to
expand and develop these facilities as may be needed
to meet demand, and shall cooperate with established
promotional and advertising groups such as motor
clubs, travel agencies, chambers of commerce, the
North Carolina Department of Conservation and De-velopment,
etc.
There shall be two classes of membership : Active
and associate. Associate members shall be those
companies, organizations or businesses operating pri-marily
to serve the traveling public and any who may
be so classified shall be eligible for membership.
The principal financial support of the Council's ac-tivities
shall be from the various dues paid by asso-ciate
members, the amounts of such dues to be fixed
by the directors, but associate members shall have no
voting rights in the Council, nor shall they hold of-fice
in the Council.
Active members shall be elected by the Board of
Directors and shall be limited to individuals who are
officers or employees or other designated represen-tatives
of a company or organization which is an
associate member of the Council. At all general
meetings of the Council each active member shall be
entitled to one vote, and all officers and directors of
the Council shall be active members. Dues for ac-tive
members shall be $10.00 per year for each per-son.
Three members of the 15-member board of direc-tors
have already been named: Former Governor
Broughton, representing the East ; Coleman Roberts,
representing the West ; and Richard S. Tufts, repre-senting
the Central section of the State. These three
members have also been authorized to serve as a
nominating committee to select the remaining mem-bers
for presentation to the incorporators of the
Council. Ex-Governor Broughton is preparing the
necessary legal documents incident to obtaining a
charter.
Thus, North Carolina is on the way in a program
to develop this potentially powerful industry for the
benefit of all the people of the State.
PAGE 1 00 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY
FALL, 1945
Room clerk registers a new-comer.
Long established as a travel state, North Carolina
currently sees prospects of doubling its tourist trade
in immediate years.
The travel situation had remained somewhat static
until 1936 when the Great Smoky Mountains
National Park was opened. Until then, the Blue
Ridge country, headquartered at Asheville, had been
the traditional summering place of a steadily grow-ing
number of midwesterners, southerners, a few
northerners.
The new national park, embracing the little- known climax of the Appalachian system, quickly
climbed m favor, and in 1941 was the most popular
park m America, outstripping Shenandoah by a
substantial margin. Returns from the tourist busi-ness
rose from an estimated $35,000,000 in 1936 to
an estimated $175,000,000 in 1941.
Future trade prospects have been enhanced by
the fact that Cape Hatteras National Seashore,
authorized by Congress, is due for development
within the next few years. At the same time, the
Blue Ridge Parkway, America's first "highway
park with many links already open, will be com-pleted
within an estimated three years. Resumption
of Paul Green s famous "Lost Colony" is expected to
stimulate travel into northeastern North Carolina
Other major state and federal-supported travel- enticmg projects have been approved.
WESTERN NORTH CAROLINA
Western North Carolina already is a well-known
playground, with varied resorts and a large summer children s camp industry. Substantial developments
are planned for postwar years. The Park Service
Memo on Tra
By Bill Sh>
has recently announced plans for new roads giving; more convenient access to the Great Smokies Park
Additional camp and trailer grounds and lodge ac- commodations are contemplated.
The TVA program has changed the face of many western North Carolina communities, where sky-blue
lakes are filling mountain coves. While TVA itself plans no recreational developments, it is coop-erating
with local, state and federal agencies to
utilize advantages offered by the lakes. Recently,
the Park Service acquired additional land for the
Great Smokies so that new Fontana Dam will pro-vide
a shoreline for part of the park, with oppor-tunities
for lake fishing, bathing, boating in the
heart of the Smokies. Towns and counties are ac-quiring
park rights along TVA shorelines, with
S-vT 5* dev
f
loPment- Through agreement IV with A, the Park Service plans a new highway from
Fontana Dam to Bryson City, providing a new park
entrance.
A PARK 500 MILES LONG
Most spectacular development in western North
Carolina will be the Blue Ridge Parkway, which was
started several years ago. With several stretches
already muse, the completed parkway eventually
will join Shenandoah and Great Smoky Mountain
rarks. It is difficult to describe adequately this
pleasure boulevarde to one who has not driven it Rights of way have been acquired on each side so
that there are no disturbing commercial elements in
S 7^° SlgnS
'
hot dog stands> souvenir peddlers
if or 500 miles one can ride over an easily graded,
softly curved highway which soars with the ridges
at an average altitude of 3,000 feet. Designed for
pleasure and not for engineering utility, the Park- way bores through mountains, across great fills over
valleys, winds miles away from "practical" routes
to bring the traveller to breath-taking views. Along
the route are bulges which will provide rest facilities
—picnic areas, turn-outs, overlooks, and other con-veniences
and pleasures.
The National Park Service once estimated the Parkway would handle 3,000,000 tourists a year.
North Carolina officials think postwar travel de- mands will up that figure by another million.
The Parkway will take visitors through the upper
Blue Ridge Country into the Grandfather region on
past Mt. Mitchell, thence to Craggy Gardens, past
Asheville into the Pisgah and westward, through
boco Gap into Indian land, and so on to Clingman's
Dome, highest peak in the Smokies.
NATIONAL FORESTS
A large part of Western North Carolina lies
within the purchase and development areas of the
National Forest Service. In both Pisgah and
Nantahala National Forests, recreational areas have
been completed and are open. Especially in the
Sapphire country, along Rt. 64, are camping, swim-
FALL, 1945 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 101
North Carolina
te News Bureau
ming, fishing, picnicking areas, and more are due to
be opened. Managed fishing and hunting are per-mitted
on thousands of acres of these public lands.
More vacation spots are being made accessible by
a network of state park and forest roads, and places
denied the wheeled visitor also have been opened up
by a system of marked and graded trails. In the
Smokies alone are 500 miles of these trails, forming
a great outdoor communication system for the hiker
or horseback rider. In Pisgah and Nantahala, the
Forest Service has also developed a trail system
which is used extensively. The Appalachian Trail,
which is marked from Maine to Georgia, follows the
highest ridges of North Carolina, with log lean-to
shelters spotted a day's journey apart, with firewood,
water and toilet, and other facilities nearby. Several
dude ranches have been established to take ad-vantage
of the outdoor areas. An active youth
hostel loop is in operation.
EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA
North Carolina beaches in the past largely have
been patronized by upstate Tar Heels. In the last
few years, however, sportsmen have discovered the
good fishing grounds lying at the capes and off the
banks, and the excellent waterfowl shooting at famed
Mattamuskeet and Currituck, and elsewhere.
A few years ago, the National Park Service, after
a survey, selected the Banks of North Carolina as
the site for the first National seashore park. The
area would extend from Currituck bank to Ocracoke
Inlet, and would comprise eventually some 100,000
acres, much of it on unspoiled beaches or sound
fronts.
The State of North Carolina has created a Sea-shore
Commission to acquire the necessary land.
In the area—one of the most romantic and iso-lated
in this country—lies Kill Devil Hill, Fort
Raleigh, Cape Hatteras, and other historic points.
The Park would take in most of the Outer Banks
—
jutting 30 miles into the Atlantic, with Pamlico
Sound on its back—and comprise one of the greatest
sport fishing areas in America. Here loll the cop-pery
channel bass, the flashy dolphin, the amber-jack,
bonita, the fighting Hatteras blue, as well as a
host of good panfish—mackerel, trout, flounder,
sheepshead.
The banks will soon get an "experimental" road
from Oregon Inlet to Hatteras—forerunner, per-haps,
of a hardsurface highway. Bridges across
Alligator River and Croatan Sound, to make the
park area more accessible, are contemplated by the
State.
But more than shorebirds, fishing and surf-bath-ing
are contemplated. Paul Green's symphonic
drama, "Lost Colony", presented at open air Water-side
Theatre on Roanoke Island each summer until
1941, is to be revived. Former Governor Broughton
heads a committee to raise $100,000 to rebuild the
theatre.
In the kitchen of Pinnacle Inn.
Presented nightly from July 1 to Labor Day, "Lost
Colony" is an outdoor spectacle performed in a
unique theatre where scene shifting is done through
use of lights and different stage levels. Over 150
persons are in the cast. From 1937 to 1941 the play
attracted 400,000 spectators.
Nearby is historic Kill Devil Hill, surmounted by
the Wright Memorial. Now it is planned to bring
the original Wright plane back to the site of its first
flight and to house it in a suitable building, where
it will be another attraction of the Seashore park.
Also planned: a Coast Guard Museum; fishermen's
cabins at the cape ; a bicycle trail.
North Carolina is talking of more things for the
traveller. Recently, the Department of Conserva-tion
and Development accepted the offer of a
generous woman who proposes to restore Tryon's
Palace at New Bern, on Trent and Neuse Rivers.
Only one wing of the original palace, once called "the
most beautiful building in America," is now stand-ing,
but the original plans have been discovered, and
rebuilding of the royal governor's palace will com-mence
as soon as possible. $300,000 already has been
made available ; $500,000 or more eventually will be
expended for the restoration which will be one of
the show places of America. The state has appro-priated
$100,000 to acquire adjacent land for the
project.
STATE PARKS
Resumption of state park services, now largely
curtailed, with expansion of facilities, and the addi-tion
of other areas has been recommended. Cabins,
to be rented for moderate fees, are to be erected at
PAGE 1 02 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY
FALL, 1945
J
Waitress takes the luncheon order.
: '': -K ',
Caring for hotel grounds. This girl took on a man's job
during the war.
Chambermaid on duty at mountain resort.
the parks and a lodge with cabins attached is Planned at Mt. Mitchell State Park, atop eastern America's highest peak.
Cabins also are planned at Mt. Morrow and Hang- iB
p^ At Pettigrew State Park, on Lake 16,000-acre Phelps m eastern Carolina, the Pettigrew plan-tation
home has already been restored, and the 16- room mansion will be available to vacationists and sport fishermen who come to the lake for the fine
iTn^t r? ^n§
- F°rt Macon
' on the banks
opposite Beaufort, is now occupied as a military in-stallation
but plans for its conversion into a State Beach will be resumed after the war. Cape Hat
teras State Park, with its modern cabins for surf
fishermen, will be incorporated in the National Sea- shore area.
STATE LAKES
North Carolina owns a chain of clear-water lakes m eastern Carolina, and some of these already are m use Smgletary Lake, a beautiful cypress-shaded
body of water now is used for group camping, and has dining halls, cabins and shelters. Jones Lake nearby, has been set aside as a resort for Negroes' The government recently turned Crabtree Creek
area over to the state, and the 80 cabins there are
available the year around for vacationists. The
legislature authorized the parks division to take over
Cliffs of the Neuse, near Goldsboro, as a riverside
and developed
6
" *** "^^^^* Mquired
SANDHILLS
The oldest winter resort country in North Caro- line—the gandhil! pine lands—have been partly
occupied by the military, but all hotels now have been returned to private operation, and this winter
golf capital of America, noted for its five so]f courses at Pinehurst and Southern Pines, and for its fox hunting, quail, and horse activities, are open in winter Full programs, including the many golf and tennis tournaments and the well-known steeplechase,
will be resumed.
HUNTING AND FISHING
Anticipating an unprecedented crop of outdoor
enthusiastics returning to normal civilian life, North Carolina is seriously concerned with the prob- lem of providing game. On federal-state wild-life management areas a large program of stocking of
fish and game is being carried out. Deer are trapped m over-populated areas and released in other sec-tions.
An attempt now is being made to return deer
to the Piedmont area, where they long since had been shot out. Hatcheries are restocking streams On management areas, public bear, deer and boar
hunts are held. An extensive game and fish propa-gation
program is being blue-printed.
STATE AID
+>1
T
!;
e State of North Carolina is backing plans of the National Forest Service, the Park Service, TVA
Sam
Pn
Tfc
te dr?TY
?
ln thG P0Stwar travel P™:
grain, ine state highway department's large and growing surplus will be thrown into a large postwar
FALL, 1945 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 1 03
highway construction program. Roads will be
widened, and new highways built to make attractive
spots more accessible.
A new two-way road, running from the Blue
Ridge Parkway to the summit of Mt. Mitchell al-ready
has been approved. A road now crosses Lake
Mattamuskeet, and the banks will be brought within
the range of new bus lines by bridges across Alli-gator
River and Croatan Sound. A road is now
being roughed out to Hatteras. Long ago, the state
made all bridges toll-free, and also operates general
toll-free ferries.
The state's Advertising Division estimates that
postwar travel in North Carolina will amount to
nearly half a billion dollars a year, making the state
among the leaders in travel volume. A subcommittee
has been named to interest capital in building more
resorts to meet the anticipated demands of a travel-hungry
nation. The State Planning Board is coop-erating
in the enterprise.
HOTEL SERVICES
Basic to the travel industry are the types of
service rendered by hotel employees. The pictures
which accompany this article were taken by Mr.
Hemmer of the State News Bureau to illustrate such
services. These show summer activities at Pinnacle
iiiiiiii -': :';:-:
.
.
' ..: v.
f;
: v;v"
Life-guard at Wildcat Lake.
Inn, which is a unique resort in that during the
winter months it is in reality Lees-McRae College.
During the summer season the college buildings
provide hotel accommodations, and the students
render all the service operations as part of a self-help
program.
TIPS AS WAGES
Up until March 6, 1945, the Commission had a
great deal of trouble in trying to get reports from
operators of hotels and restaurants and similar estab-lishments,
upon the tips received by bellboys, wait-resses
and other such employees. For the last few
months before the 6th of March, and for the months
between the 6th of March and the 1st of July, the
traveling auditors examined a great many accounts.
Sometime in the winter of 1945 a committee of hotel
keepers and their attorney, Mr. J. C. B. Ehringhaus,
appeared before the Commission in an effort to find
some fair and equitable way to tax employers on tips
received by their employees.
The discussion was both pro and con, and the
Commission finally determined that it was so diffi-cult
to account for tips that it could not fairly tax
the employers for tips received by employees, so
the Commission passed the following regulation
:
Rule 2. Gratuities: (A) Any gratuities custo-marily
received by an individual in the course of his
work from persons other than his employing unit
shall be treated as wages paid such individual and
shall be added to any other remuneration paid to
such individual by such employing unit for the pur-pose
of preparing reports required by and in calcu-lating
the contributions due the Unemployment
Compensation Commission ; provided, such gratuities
are reported by such individual to the employing
unit on forms prescribed by the Commission and fur-nished
to the individual by the employing unit, with-in
three days after the end of the pay period in
which received.
(B) If the employing unit deems the amount of
gratuities reported in accordance with Section (A)
of this rule to be unreasonable or excessive, the em-ploying
unit shall include such amount in his reports
to the Commission under protest, and any protest so
made shall be investigated and determined in such
manner as the Commission may prescribe.
(C) Neither this rule nor any regulation or in-struction
issued pursuant thereto is to be construed
as authorizing any employing unit to demand of any
individual performing services for it a report or ac-counting
of gratuities received, or to require such in-dividual
to render such report or accounting. If any
individual fails to report gratuities received as pro-vided
in Section (A) of this rule, however, such
gratuities shall not be considered as wages, except
on a showing of good cause to the Commission within
45 days of the end of the applicable pay period for
such failure to report such gratuities.
This will permit the bellboys and waitresses and
others receiving gratuities in the performance of
their duties to make reports to their employers. The
employers will then have to include such amounts
in their quarterly wage reports to the Commission
and will have to pay contributions upon these
amounts. The employees receiving tips and gratui-ties
will thus have these credits to their wage rec-ords
and included in subsequent calculation as to the
amount of weekly benefits to be paid them if unem-ployed.
The Commission thought that this was the fairest
way out of a very difficult situation. The hotel men,
restaurant keepers and others employing people who
receive tips or gratuities, agreed with the Commis-sion.
This regulation went into effect July 1, 1945.
C. U. HARRIS.
PAGE 104 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY FALL, 1945
READJUSTMENT PROBLEMS
From now on, thousands of workers in North
Carolina, and millions throughout the country, will
be changing jobs. Skills learned in wartime may be
of little use to them in the peacetime economy. Jobs
may develop in places far from the cities or town
where they now live. They may work shorter hours,
and their take-home pay may be less.
Unemployment compensation will help many of
them to bridge the gap between jobs. But unem-ployment
compensation is not a subsidy for idleness.
It can be paid only to workers who are seeking jobs
they cannot find.
Our law in North Carolina, like those of other
states, has safeguards to prevent payment of bene-fits
to people who do not want to work or who are
unable to work. But in the present situation, ad-ministrators
are faced with many questions in de-termining
whether an individual is eligible for
benefits.
Refusing suitable work, being unavailable for
work or unable to work, and quitting a job volun-tarily,
are the three principal reasons for disquali-fying
a worker. Following are some of the basic
questions of policy that will have to be decided
:
1. What is suitable work? Should "suitability"
be determined as a job for which a person is qualified
by recent experience, or should it be related to a
worker's pre-war job or should both recent and
earlier experience be considered in the light of what
jobs are available?
Examples
:
A mechanic who earned $1.80 an hour during the
war is offered a job at 65 cents an hour. If he re-fuses
it, should he be denied unemployment in-surance
benefits?
A drug store clerk has become a skilled machine
operator in a war plant and his wages have
amounted to about $80 a week. After he is laid off,
he is offered a job as a clerk at $20 a week. If he
refuses it, should he be disqualified for unemploy-ment
insurance benefits, or should he be given time
to look around for a job in his line at higher pay?
Many women took industrial jobs during the war.
Some of them will want to return to homemaking,
but some will want to continue to work. If they are
laid off, what sort of work should be considered
"suitable" for them? Should they be required to
take housework or other work at much lower pay if
factory jobs cannot be found?
If jobs at high pay are not available, how much
time will unemployed persons be given to appraise
the situation before being offered whatever work is
available, or denied benefits?
2. When is a worker able to work and available
for work? Must he be able to take any job regard-less
of its physical requirements? Must he be avail-able
for work on any shift, regardless of home con-ditions?
How far from home must the worker be
willing to go, to be considered available for work?
Examples:
A 58-year-old man is laid off his war job. The
only work to be had involves heavy lifting. Should
he be disqualified for unemployment insurance bene-fits
because he is unable to take the job, because he
cannot do heavy lifting?
A woman is laid off from a plant in her home
town. The only work to be had is 35 miles away, in
another town. She cannot adjust her household
schedule to include the 3-hour travel time involved in
taking such a job. Should she be considered un-available
for work and denied benefits?
3. Should a worker be disqualified if he quits his
job voluntarily for good personal cause? In North
Carolina, if a worker quits his employment for a
reason not connected with the work or the employer,
he forfeits benefit payments for from 4 to 12 weeks.
Example:
A widow quits her job to take care of a sick child
at home. When the child is well and going back to
school, should she be denied her unemployment in-surance
benefits while looking for another job?
Suitable Work In the Post-War Period
By Irene M. Zaccaro, Referee for Unemployment Compensation Board of Maryland
The question of what is suitable work can be ap-proached
from more than one viewpoint—that of
the claimant, the employer, the labor union, the un-employment
compensation board or commission and
perhaps the employment service. Our specific prob-lem,
as unemployment compensation personnel, is to
coordinate these often conflicting views in an at-tempt
to obtain the perfect answer—that attainment
is well nigh impossible.
Specifically we are confronted with the opinion of
the claimant in contrast to, what we hope is, our
impartial opinion. The claimant has a keen personal
*The substance of this article was delivered as a paper
at a Regional Meeting of the Interstate Conference of Em-ployment
Security Agencies held in Richmond, Va., July,
1945.
interest in what is suitable work for him and he is
not interested in definitions of suitable work. If he
does not think a job is suitable he has many reasons
why and frequently his reasons have little relation
to the suitability of work as we consider it. The un-employment
compensation law gives us a definition
of suitable work or rather an outline to follow in
determining suitable work.
An examination of the laws of the states (North
Carolina, Virginia, West Virginia and Maryland) in
this Region, including the District of Columbia,
shows a similarity in this regard, so that in follow-ing
the Maryland Law practical application is being
made of the laws of these other states.
To interpret these provisions of the unemploy-ment
compensation laws equitably and to the under-
FALL, 1945 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 1 05
standing and satisfaction of the claimant, in this
post-war period, requires the wisdom of Solomon and
the courage of Daniel.
WAGES, HOURS AND
CONDITIONS OF WORK
Work is considered unsuitable for a claimant "if
the wages, hours, or other conditions of the work
offered are substantially less favorable to the in-dividual
than those prevailing for similar work in the
locality." (Maryland Law, Sec. 5(c) (2).)
WAGES
What will be the basis for comparison in order to
determine suitable wages for particular types of
work in the post-war period; will it be the pre-war
period beginning with the effectiveness of the un-employment
compensation laws to the middle of 1940
when the defense program began; or the period of
intensive war work ; or the post-war period ?
Will a comparison of the pre-war wage scale and
the wage scale during the war assist in reaching an
average wage, which will represent the post-war
wage scale ? Or, will it be an average wage derived
from a comparison of the pre-war wages and the
wages offered after the war? Or, will the war time
wage be the basis for determining a reasonable wage
in the present post-war period.
One view is that the last wages received by the
individual (in war work) will not be a fair basis for
reaching a wage rate in the future because of the
abnormally high average weekly earnings, but that
from an analysis of the wages offered for particular
types of work after the war an average rate can be
determined.
Another, and this is the view I incline to, is that
the war work rates, because of restrictions imposed
by the Federal Government, did not represent a sub-stantial
increase, if any, in rates and should be the
basis for any reasonably fair determination of the
post-war wage rates.
Actually, the high wages paid to war workers
were not due in the main to an increase of hourly
or piece work rates, but to the long hours which
resulted in time and a half and double time for over-time
work, plus a bonus for work on the night shifts.
There has been a substantial decrease in the pay
envelope because of reduced working hours (and for
thousands of workers there is not even any longer
a pay envelope) , but in considering a wage rate it is
the rate per hour for straight time, or on the weekly
basis of wages for a 40-hour week.
HOURS
Hours of work during the war were long and
changing; all war industries exceeded 40 hours a
week ; there were three shifts in most plants ; work-ers
in many instances had to take their turn on all
three shifts.
We remember the objections raised by claimants
against six and seven days a week work; against
shift work. Then came the complaint, as hours of
work were reduced, that unless they have overtime
work their earnings would be reduced ; applicants be-gan
objecting to work which did not present the op-portunity
for overtime.
The demand for overtime cannot be considered as
legitimate reason for refusing employment, when
there is not the need for overtime; generally, there
will be very little overtime, if any at all. The con-sensus
of opinion, so far as I have been able to
gather, is that normal hours of work will be 40 hours
a week. The out-of-state claimant who quit employ-ment
when hours were reduced, with the consequent
decrease in earnings, placed himself in the position
where the suitability of work for him must be judged
from the circumstances surrounding work which
might exist in his home community.
A demand by a claimant for shift work, with the
bonus for night work, will be unreasonable when,
probably, there is no occasion for more than one
shift in most industries. There will be some shift
work in isolated plants, and if an individual can be
placed therein so much the better, otherwise day
work is suitable work.
The tendency back to day work for women
should not be disqualifying, unless it is the custom
and practice of the industry to which she applies to
operate on two or more shifts.
During the conversion period there will be a con-siderable
reduction in hours of work, as one of the
results of conversion might be the spreading of
hours of work so as to provide employment for dis-charged
war workers and returning veterans. Peace
time production may, however, provide not only
regular full-time employment, but a great deal of
overtime. If there is a tendency to overtime work,
a refusal of employment requiring overtime will be
unreasonable. An exception is noted in regard to
women workers, where family and household respon-sibilities
again can be given more consideration.
During the war period family and household duties,
except where very young children were involved,
were not considered as good cause for refusing other-wise
suitable work, but now the swing is back to a
more liberal attitude in this connection. However, it
is probable that many women will return to their
homes or change over to employment other than in-dustrial,
but where the worker holds out for a type
of work (which there is little likelihood of obtaining)
which requires overtime or shift work meanwhile ob-jecting
to either, her objection would be without
good cause.
CONDITIONS OF WORK
The subject of conditions of work will be treated
generally, since it is impossible to go into each ques-tion
which might arise. There was a general im-provement
in working conditions during the war, al-though
Labor says some of its privileges were re-laxed
so as not to hinder the war effort. Whether
Management will drop all or some of these improve-ments
time will tell. No doubt Labor will try and re-gain
the privileges it suspended or gave up during
the war, as well as struggle to retain the gains made.
However, when we consider the question of work-ing
conditions, I believe the manner in which we
handled it in these past years will be as safe a means
PAGE 1 06 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY FALL, 1945
as any. Comparing the conditions the claimant ob-jects
to with similar conditions in the industry; here,
as formerly, it will be the obligation of the claimant
to prove to the satisfaction of the unemployment
compensation agency that the condition or conditions
complained of are bad, whether he refers to safety,
sanitation, lighting, location, etc., or whether he does
not like the shape of the foreman's nose. If the ob-jection
is that the machine he must operate has a left
foot pedal rather than a right foot pedal, then the
claimant ought to start using his left foot (unless he
has only a right foot).
PROSPECT OF GETTING LOCAL
WORK VERSUS OUT-OF-TOWN WORK
Several questions raise their heads here ; the work-er
whose work had been entirely in the area where
he lives; the worker who never has had industrial
employment in his home area ; the worker who had a
low paying job in his home locality and removed tem-porarily
to a place where there was industrial em-ployment
; and the worker who always has travelled
from place to place in the practice of his trade.
The worker who never has had industrial em-ployment
or regular employment of any kind, ex-cluding
odd jobs, in his home locality, who returns
home after employment elsewhere has terminated
and who refuses to leave his home for suitable work
in another area removes himself from the labor mar-ket
and is unavailable for work. He never had work
in his home area and the likelihood is that he never
will have work there; if unemployment compensa-tion
benefits were a reward for past employment,
then he would be paid; but unemployment com-pensation
benefits are for persons unemployed
through no fault of .their own. The continued unem-ployment
of such an individual would be due to his
voluntary act in refusing to go to a place where
there is work. It is not unreasonable to offer that
person work which may require him to leave his
home locality, if the other conditions of suitability
are met in the work offered to him.
It would be unreasonable to offer work out-of-town
to an individual who has lived and worked in
one place if there is prospect of work for him in his
locality. If his type of work leaves the town or city,
he will not be expected to follow it immediately ; he
ought to be permitted a period of time (which will
vary with the circumstances of each case) in which
to find other suitable work. Then either he ought
to change his work requirement or accept out-of-town
employment. He cannot demand benefits if he
refuses to change to other employment locally, while
insisting that he remain fixed in his residence.
The applicant who had a low paying job in his
home locality before the war and returned home,
after having had employment in war work elsewhere,
must be available for work similar to that which he
had before the war or work which is to be had in
his locality at the wages, hours and under the cir-cumstances
prevailing for that work, or he must be
willing to accept employment out-of-town. To re-fuse
local work because his last employment in war
work away from home was of a different kind, with
higher earnings, etc., while preferring to remain at
home where work within his immediate prior expe-rience
is not available would disqualify the claimant.
If he is willing to accept work locally and the work
exists, although there may not be any immediate
openings, the claimant would be eligible for benefits.
Where it has been and is the custom of the trade
for a worker to travel from place to place, in the
performance of his work, a refusal of work because
it is out-of-town would be sufficient to disqualify the
claimant.
IMMEDIATE PRIOR EARNINGS
IN WAR INDUSTRY VERSUS NORMAL
PEACE-TIME INDUSTRY EARNINGS
What are "normal peace-time industry earnings?"
This will be an important and recurring question in
the years just ahead. My opinion is that we do not
have any criterion to follow. In the years preceding
the war we were not so much in "normal peace-time"
as in the tail end of a depression period with govern-ment-
created jobs and a somewhat artificial wage
structure. In the discussion under "Wages" the
opinion was expressed that the war industry wages
would be the best gauge for ascertaining industry
earnings in this period of post-war conversion. There
will be necessary adjustments in wage rates, and a
gradual development of peace-time wage rates in in-dustry.
Our tendency should be, where a wage rate
for comparable work drops considerably below the
war-time rate, to make comparison with the rate
prior to the war, at the same time remembering the
increased living costs and increased income taxes
still confronting the worker.
Many workers will have to return to work which
does not pay and did not pay them the earnings they
had in war industry. A demand for earnings in the
former work equal to their war earnings is not
justified. Even those workers who remain in work
similar to that which they had in war industry, per-haps
for the same employer, may complain that their
earnings have been reduced, not in the rate, but in
reduction of hours or smaller volume of work (piece
work) ; such complaint if offered as reason for quit-ting
or refusing any offer of otherwise suitable work
is without merit. The working hours in war time
have been abnormal; the volume of work also was
abnormal. The ratings held by many workers were
abnormal in that persons of limited qualifications
had been in either supervisory capacities or in jobs
that in normal times would be considered beyond
their skill and experience. With a return to peace-time
standards, the worker should adjust himself
accordingly; any contrary demand might be cause
for disqualification.
Considered from the standpoint of wage scale,
there will not be much difference between the war
time and the post-war wage. There will be a dif-ference,
often quite substantial, due primarily to the
decrease in working hours, which neither the em-ployer
nor the applicant can control, and the worker
should conform to existing circumstances. The
problem of providing jobs in substantial volume dur-ing
this period will depend, to some extent, upon
whether one worker will be employed long hours so
he can maintain a high earnings level, or whether
FALL. 1945 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 107
more than one worker will have a job for a normal
work week. The demands of the claimant will be
considered in the light of the policies and practices
which develop in industry after the war, and their
reasonableness determined.
REQUIREMENT AS TO JOINING UNION
This question must be approached from two
angles—whether the claimant is to retain his free-dom
of choice regarding union membership, or
whether he should accept (involuntarily) the benefits
of union membership in order to obtain employment.
The unemployment compensation laws are silent
on this point, so that by inference and interpretation
it can be held that refusal to accept work because
union membership is required constitutes a refusal
of suitable work. There has always been some doubt
whether the unemployment compensation laws are
not discriminatory in this matter. If an applicant
cannot be required to "resign from or refrain from
joining any bona fide labor organization," then why
should he be disqualified for failure to accept work
which would require him to join a bona fide labor
organization ?
If a claimant does not want to belong to a union, he
may have many good or even foolish reasons for his
attitude, depending upon the other person's point of
view, but he ought to have the privilege of making
a free choice without the shadow of a possible dis-qualification
hanging over him.
PRIOR TRAINING AND EXPERIENCE
This is a problem which will come up with fre-quency
in the era of peace ahead. The individual
who was in an industry before the war may not be
difficult to handle ; there will be some place for him
in that industry when it reconverts, and a short
period of time may be the only element involved.
The persons who went from school or work far re-moved
from industrial employment into war work
will be faced, many of them, with the question of re-adjustment.
This applies, too, to many who were not
employed at all prior to the war.
The first effort should be to try and refer the
claimant to the same type of work he was doing ; sec-ondly,
refer him to related work ; thirdly, divert his
abilities into work where he can be readily trained
;
and finally, if the training and experience gained in
a war industry cannot be utilized in peace-time, then
the applicant must be diverted into new work or to
work performed prior to the war. This will be a
matter of education, and a real job is here for the em-ployment
service.
From the standpoint of suitable work, however,
the claimant should be permitted a reasonable length
of time, during which he is receiving benefits, within
which to obtain work in line with his training and
experience. The period of unemployment will vary
with the circumstances of each case, but after that
time it will be up to the claimant to cooperate by go-ing
into new and related work.
A claimant cannot hold out indefinitely for work
which may have ceased entirely or where the pros-pects
of obtaining such work are remote. An offer
of work is suitable if the claimant's training and ex-perience
can be utilized and the employer is willing
to afford him the necessary training.
Offering a claimant work in line with his pre-war
experience would be an offer of suitable work, if the
chances of employment in work similar to "his war
work experience are meagre.
NATURE OF DISQUALIFICATION
There is no definite yard stick for the measure-ment
of disqualifications. The possibility does exist
that in the post-war period an individual's failure to
accept, what under the circumstances of his case
would be, suitable work will necessitate a determina-tion
of unavailability ; however, such a determination
will be based on all facts surrounding him and not
merely because the claimant refused employment.
Where an individual persists in refusing to accept
suitable work the maximum disqualification in num-ber
of weeks will be warranted, perhaps on more
than one occasion.
If during what is considered a reasonable period
of unemployment an individual refuses work, which
might subsequently be considered suitable because
his chances of securing other work have decreased,
then there should not be any disqualification. Later
on, beginning with a moderate penalty, a disqualifi-cation
would be necessitated.
Those individuals who because of lack of work in
an industrial area return to their former homes,
where employment opportunities do not exist, will
be eligible for benefits so long as suitable work (again
the circumstances of each case will be controlling)
is not available or offered to them. Disqualifications
will follow failures to apply for or accept work
offered.
RESEARCH REPORT
America has a good chance of getting through the
present reconversion period without mass unemploy-ment
or severe business dislocation, according to sub-stantial
opinion among the country's leading econo-mists
who are participating in a symposium on
"Financing American Prosperity."
The Twentieth Century Fund, an institute for
scientific research in current economic problems be-lieves
that "the great majority of war workers" were
doing exactly the kind of work during the war they
will do in time of peace. The average amount of un-employment
during the first year after the war with
Japan will be around 4.5 million.
Only about five million war workers were em-ployed
in plants which will make large permanent
lay-offs and approximately 10 per cent of war work-ers
were in plants where engineering problems of
conversion will halt production as long as 4 months.
To safeguard the country against deflation, the
government should facilitate a quick shift from war
production to civilian production, reform the tax
system, extend and liberalize unemployment com-pensation
schemes, and plan prompt expenditures on
the repair and maintenance of public property. To
guard against a disorderly rise in prices, the govern-ment
should retain price controls and the regulation
of consumer credit throughout the period of conver-sation
and probably for a year or two longer.
PAGE 1 08 THE U. C C. QUARTERLY FALL, 1945
The Law in Action
By Bruce Billings, Sen
During the three months period ending August
31, 1945, the Commission handed down decisions in
ten cases involving benefit rights of claimants. In
six of these cases, the question of the availability of
the individuals for work under the Unemployment
Compensation Law was presented. In two of these
cases, the claimants voluntarily separated from their
employment and had been denied statements of
availability by the War Manpower Commission for
a period of sixty days. The Commission held such
individuals to be ineligible during the period for
which they were denied statements of availability
under Commission Statement of Policy Number 9
which at that time provided, "That any claimant who
as a prerequisite to employment is required to
possess a statement of availability or its equivalent
under the rules and regulations of the War Man-power
Commission shall not be considered available
for work within the meaning of the Unemployment
Compensation Law during any period with respect to
which he does not possess or is unable to procure
such statement or its equivalent * * *" It is well
to note in this connection that this statement of
policy is now obsolete and ineffective since the recent
lifting of the manpower restrictions.
In two cases it was found that the claimants had
so restricted the conditions under which they would
accept employment that the possibility and prospect
of such individals securing employment was practi-cally
eliminated, and it was therefore determined
that such individuals were not available for work
within the meaning of the law. In one of these
instances, the claimant refused to accept any work
except with her last employer on the first shift and
in one particular department in which she formerly
worked. The claimant in the other case referred
to had been unemployed for thirteen months and had
never earned more than $18.00 a week in employ-ment,
but made it a condition that she receive at
least $35.00 per week in any work offered her. In
view of the length of claimant's unemployment and
her previous earnings, it was held that she was not
available for work. It was decided, however, in an-other
case that a claimant who was the mother of
two small children had not unreasonably restricted
her availability when she was willing to accept any
suitable work on the first shift and had made ar-rangements
for the care of her children during the
working hours of the first shift. In the only other
instance involving availability it was determined that
the mother of a small child who could not make ar-rangements
for the care of the child in case she was
offered suitable work and for that reason could not
accept suitable work, did not meet the eligibility re-quirement
of availability.
In the only case involving a procedural question,
the Commission upheld the decision of the Appeals
Deputy dismissing the claimant's appeal when such
appeal was not entered within the time required by
statute and when the claimant could not show any
good reasons for not noting the appeal within the
time required by statute.
ior Attorney, U. C. C.
When a claimant was offered work as a sander at
50c an hour, and it appeared that such individual
had recently undergone an operation and was un-able
to perform work of such arduous nature, and
when it further appeared that such person had good
reason to believe that he would secure work of less
arduous nature within a short time at a rate of 85c
an hour, it was held that he did not refuse available
suitable work without good cause and no disqualifi-cation
was inflicted.
In a case in which the claimants—employees of a
full fashion hosiery mill were unemployed due to a
labor dispute between the knitters in the plant and
the management, the Commission determined that
all such claimants-employees were ineligible for bene-fits
for the reason that the work performed by all
such individuals was of the same general type and
that their jobs were part of a chain of production and
that the operation of one group depended upon the
continuance of the work of the others. The Commis-sion
found that the relationship existing between the
jobs of the claimants-employees and the jobs of those
who voluntarily quit work placed the claimants and
those workers in the same class of workers, and that
such individuals were therefore ineligible for benefits
under Section 96-14 (d) (2) of the Law which pro-vides
that any individual shall be disqualified for
benefits for any week with respect to which it is
found that his unemployment is due to a stoppage
of work which exists because of a labor dispute at
the factory at which he is or was last employed un-less
such individual shows to the satisfaction of the
Commission that he does not' belong to a grade or
class of workers of which immediately before the
commencement of the stoppage there were members
employed at the premises at which the stoppage oc-curred
any of whom are participating in or financing
or directly interested in the dispute.
The Commission handed down opinions in ten
cases involving interpretations of the coverage sec-tion
of the law. In eight of these cases the employ-ing
units were held to be liable under the statute for
contributions on wages earned by employees. Three
of the cases involved the question as to whether the
employer had worked eight or more individuals in
twenty different weeks in a calendar year. In two
cases liability was found to exist and in one case the
Commission found there was no liability. There were
three cases decided which involved interpretation of
what was formerly the contractors clause in the law.
(Amended 3-13-45). In two of these cases the em-ployer
was found to be liable for contributions on the
earnings paid to employees of a contractor who was
performing services for such employer in the course
of the employer's usual business and in the other
case of this kind the Commission found no liability
for the reason that the services being performed by
the contractor were not in the principal's usual trade
or business. One employer was liable under the law
by virtue of having acquired substantially all the
assets, organization, and business of an employer
who at the time of such acquisition was a covered
employer under the Act. In another opinion, the
FALL, 1945 THE U. C C. QUARTERLY PAGE 1 09
Commission determined and held that gratuities and
tips were taxable wages under the Law. In one
instance, it was decided that solicitors for a laundry
who owned their own trucks and who were paid on
a percentage basis according to the amount of laun-dry
brought in by them were performing services in
employment under the Act. In interpreting the sec-tion
of the law relative to termination of coverage it
was determined that when an individual once be-comes
an employer under the act and subsequently
sells his business to another and then later reenters
business, that such individual continues to be a cov-ered
employer if he has never applied for and been
granted termination of coverage as provided under
the law. In defining what is agricultural labor under
the statute, it was determined that where an indi-vidual
bought hogs and livestock and maintained a
place where he fed them until they were in a mar-ketable
condition, and then sold them to various
packing companies, when such activity was not con-nected
with a farm and no grain or other feed was
grown by the individual to feed such livestock it was
concluded that the persons in the employ of such in-dividual
who performed services in the furtherance
of this business were not engaged in agricultural
labor but were engaged in a commercial enterprise
and therefore, wages earned by such individuals were
taxable under the law.
Unemployment Benefits-Picture Story from Claim to Check
By S. F. Teague, Chief Claims Deputy
Mr. S. F. Teague at his desk in the Central Raleigh Office. As
head of the Commission's Claims Department all claims
operations and business relating to claimants is under his
supervision. (Photo by R. C. Yates, Jr.)
Unemployment compensation is filling the gap be-tween
war jobs and peace jobs on an increasing scale.
The unemployment compensation program is espe-cially
suited to play this major role during industrial
reconversion—it is designed to provide a partial in-come
for covered workers during periods of tem-porary
unemployment.
For many workers, the filing of a claim for un-employment
benefits is a new experience. Their
knowledge of the procedure for filing, at the best, is
of a general nature only; they know little of how a
claim is taken and processed by the Commission and
the benefit checks finally mailed.
This illustrated article is intended to aid public un-derstanding
of the procedure followed in handling
unemployment benefits, from the time a claimant ap-plies
at a local employment office until he receives
his check for weeks of no work.
First Step. When a worker is unemployed and un-able
to find another job, he should go to the nearest
Employment Service Office. The Unemployment
Compensation Commission of North Carolina has
claims-takers located in all these offices throughout
the state.
A basic test as to whether or not a particular work-er
is unemployed—is whether or not he is seeking
work which he cannot find. Under the Unemploy-ment
Compensation Law, registering for work at a
public employment office constitutes evidence that
the worker is seeking work. A requirement for
eligibility to unemployment compensation is that the
claimant be able to work and available for work.
Consequently the first step for any worker who
loses his job is to register for work at an Employ-ment
Service Office. If the Employment Service
has a job order for which the worker is reasonably
fitted, he will be referred to the new employer.
Second Step. While he is making his first call at
the Employment Service Office, the unemployed
worker also files his claim for unemployment insur-ance
benefits. He should be sure to do this, before he
leaves the office, so that the process of looking up
First step—register for work. Registration for work comes
first in the unemployment claims procedure. At the registra-tion
desk, an applicant's work history is taken, and if there is
a job order on file which his work background indicates he can
fill, he is given a referral to that employer. Pictured here is
the reception of an applicant in one of the local Employment
Offices.
PAGE 1 1 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY FALL, 1945
his wage record account and determining the amount
of his weekly benefit check may be started. It may
be several weeks before he actually begins on a new
job. If he delays in filing a claim, he may lose out
on benefits that would otherwise be due him. Time
lost in filing a claim for insurance, is not compen-sable.
The date on which a first claim is filed, is the
date from which insurance payments are figured.
There is a one week "waiting period," and benefits
begin with a subsequent continued claim covering
the second full week of unemployment.
Filing a claim means that the worker is inter-viewed
by a claims-taker for the Unemployment
Compensation Commission, and asked, among other
things, to give his name, address, Social Security
number, name of most recent employer, and cause
for unemployment, the amount of his earnings for
the week for which he is filing, and if he is able and
available for work.
This information is entered on an initial claim
which serves as an application to determine benefit
rights. The claim is s

THE U.C. C.QUARTERLY
VOLUME 3. NO. 4 FALL 1945
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PUBLISHED BY
UNEMPLOYMENT COMPENSATION COMMISSION OF NORTH CAROLINA
PAGE 86 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY FALL, 1945
The U. C. C. Quarterly
Volume 3 ; Number 4 Fall, 1945
Issued four limes a year al Haleigh, N. C, by the
UNEMPLOYMENT COMPENSATION COMMISSION OF
NORTH CAROLINA
Commissioners : Mrs. W. T. Bost, Raleigh; Judge C. E. Cowan,
Morganton; C. A. Fink, Spencer; R. Dave Hall, Belmont;
R. Grady Rankin, Charlotte; Dr. Harry D. Wolf, Chapel Hill.
State Advisory Council: Capus Waynick, High Point, Chair-man;
Willard Dowell, Raleigh; Marion W. Heiss, Greens-boro;
H. L. Kiser, Charlotte; Dr. Thurman D. Kitchin, Wake
Forest; Robert F. Phillips, Asheville; Mrs. R. J. Reynolds,
Winston-Salem; Mrs. Emil Rosenthal, Goldsboro; W. Cedric
Stallings, Charlotte
A. L. FLETCHER Chairman
R. FULLER MARTIN Director
MRS. FRANCES T. HILL Editor
Cover illustrations represent typical North Carolina
industries under the unemployment compensation
program.
Cover for Fall. 1945—Serving Travelers on Vacation or Busi-ness
—An Important State Industry. Illustration prepared
by Hemmer, N. C. State News Bureau. Such figures as are
available show that the travel industry is of the greatest
economic importance to North Carolina. It provides em-ployment
for thousands of persons and contributes millions
of dollars to the income of the state, both directly and in-directly.
In the years immediately preceding the war, the
travel industry had shown a phenomenal growth in North
Carolina. Prospects for its development in future years
indicate much greater expansion. This issue of the Quarterly
includes articles pointing out the economic possibilities of
travel, considered as an industry, and the allied business of
hotel services.
Sent free and upon request to responsible individuals, agencies,
organizations and libraries. Address: V. C. C. Informational
Service. Raleigh. N. C.
All material published in the U. C. C. Quarterly may be re-printed
without special permission.
CONTENTS
Common Sense Regarding Unemployment 86
Facts, Figures, and Policies 87
Purchasing Power and Unemployment 87
Unemployment Compensation By The States ._ 89
Veterans Create An Airline, By E. Carl Sink 90
Vocational Training For World War Veterans,
By J. Warren Smith ____ Ti_„l. 91
The Dogwood For Luck :z __.. 94
A Banker Appraises The South, By Robert
M. Hanes _____,,__„_,.___, 95
U. C. C. Chief Looks To "North Carolina's
Future '. 97
The Travel Industry __.:_.: .. 98
Tourism Is Big Business, By Felix A.
Grisette 99
Memo On Travel In North Carolina,
By Bill Sharpe 100
Tips As Wages 103
Suitable Work In The Post-war Period,
By Irene M. Zaccaro 104
The Law In Action, By Bruce Billings 108
Unemployment Benefits, By S. F. Teague 109
Notes On U. C. C. Operations 112
Keeping Up With Industrial Expansion
And Contraction 115
Honor Roll For Industry 119
THE LAW IN ACTION
With this issue of the Quarterly, we introduce a
new feature, to be carried regularly in future issues.
This is a section, under the heading of THE LAW
IN ACTION, in which our Senior Attorney, Mr.
Bruce Billings, discusses cases which have come be-fore
the Commission for decision and how various
aspects of the Unemployment Compensation Law
apply to them. His analysis shows the manner in
which the Commission's administrative practices
and policies work when particular sets of facts are
presented for consideration. Mr. Billings is a grad-uate
of the Duke University Law School. He has
been with the Unemployment Compensation Com-mission
since December 1937, and became Senior
Attorney in November 1944.
Editors note.
COMMON SENSE
REGARDING UNEMPLOYMENT
Plenty of common sense will be needed by both
management and labor during this reconversion
period from war to peacetime work.
We have already had many problem cases where
war workers have lost highly paid jobs and have
sought job insurance when they could not find em-ployment
that used their highest skill at wages re-ceived
in war work. During the period of readjust-ment
when living costs are still high, employers
should pay as high wages as are reasonably possible
under the conditions they must meet. Full employ-ment
cannot be maintained unless there is also full
purchasing power. All elements lose when national
purchasing power is reduced by lower earnings of
the workers.
On the other hand, there probably will not be
enough high-wage jobs, at least immediately, to go
around for all who have learned new and special
skills in war work. It now appears that the recon-version
is to be less drastic in North Carolina than it
may be elsewhere in the country, because of the
character of our major industries. However, there
will be many readjustments, and we expect many
workers to file claims for unemployment insurance
during the readjustment period before they become
re-employed. Most workers should accept the best
jobs that are available at the wage rates prevailing
in their communities. This will mean that some
will necessarily have to return to former occupa-tions,
even though their pay is less than earned in
war work.
It will be far better for most displaced workers to
accept reasonable wage offers rather than to depend
on the temporary job insurance provided by our law.
The highest weekly benefit is $20 a week—available
to workers who have earned $2,080.00 or more in
their base-period year. Our average payment for
total unemployment is now around $12.00 a week.
Almost any productive job should pay a good worker
better wages than he would be eligible to draw in
benefits.
The N. C. law requires a worker to be able and
available for work, in order to be eligible for unem-
FALL, 1945 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 87
ployment compensation. A refusal of an offer of
suitable work will disqualify a claimant. Each case
considered by the Commission on its individual
merits and with due regard to job opportunities and
to wage rates that prevail in the particular com-munity.
In many cases, however, it will be neces-sary
to consider a job offer as suitable work even
though the wages are less than the individual has
earned during the war years and even though the
offered work requires less skill than was required
in his former job.
FACTS. FIGURES. AND POLICIES
After two months of reconversion, questions arose
throughout the state as to the large number of un-filled
jobs and whether or not too many released war
workers might not be drawing unemployment bene-fits—
preferring loiter to labor.
An analysis of the situation at the end of Septem-ber
revealed a very different picture. Although some
16,000 war workers had been reported laid off in
North Carolina, less than 30 percent of them were
claiming unemployment checks. Presumably the
great majority had found re-employment quickly.
The Commission was then paying benefits to
7,010 unemployed workers, of whom 1,221 became
unemployed before the end of the war. Most of these
people were skilled workers, and four out of five of
them were women. Meanwhile, the employment
offices located throughout the state were listing a
total of 40,500 job openings. Hence the questions.
The Unemployment Compensation Commission
pays benefits to covered workers who lose their jobs
through no fault of their own. To be eligible for
benefits, a worker must register for work at an em-ployment
office and must be able, available and will-ing
to work. He is not eligible for benefits if he
refuses to accept suitable work.
If he quits work voluntarily, without good cause
attributable to the employer, or if he is discharged
for misconduct connected with his work, or if he re-fuses
to accept suitable work, the worker is disquali-fied
for benefits for periods ranging from a minimum
of four to a maximum of twelve weeks and his
earned benefit amount is reduced accordingly.
The Unemployment Compensation Commission of
North Carolina believes that the North Carolina
worker, who has worked in war plants in the state
and out, and who has acquired skills that he did not
have two or three years ago, ought to be given a
reasonable time within which to find a job calling
for that skill, or to have the Employment Service
find such a job for him.
During this time our Commission thinks that he
should draw benefits as provided by law. If it turns
out that no such work is available and if the worker
refuses to accept "suitable work", then benefits
should cease. Everything hinges on what consti-tutes
"suitable work". Obviously, work suitable for
one person may not be suitable for another. There
were 7,010 people drawing compensation benefits in
North Carolina, and scattered over the 100 counties
of the state according to U. S. Employment Service
figures, were 40,500 jobs—60 percent of these for
common labor.
Of the claimants, 5,475 were women. How many,
even of the less than 2,000 men, should be required to
accept pick and shovel jobs? The issue of suitable
work varies from claimant to claimant and every
claimant's case must be decided on its own merits.
There is one sure thing about North Carolina's
unemployment compensation which claimants are
quick to discover : None is going to get rich on the
benefits. In no case can a benefit exceed $20 a week.
That is the maximum and goes to a person with
earned credits of $2,080 or more in his benefit year
and who has been earning $40 or more per week.
North Carolina's schedule of payments provided
for benefits of approximately 50 percent of a
worker's weekly earnings. The duration of pay-ments
is up to sixteen weeks, or up to sixteen times
a benefit amount within a year, should the claimant
remain totally or partially unemployed. The only
exception to this applies to a veteran, who may be
entitled to draw checks for twenty weeks, or up to
twenty times his benefit amount, within a given
year.
In so far as the policy of the Agency is concerned,
it has undertaken to guard jealously the safety of
the fund against the unscrupulous attempt of any
who might prefer loiter to labor. To this end it goes
further than practically any other state by main-taining
in the field competent claims deputies with
judicial qualifications, competent to pass upon any
legal aspect which might affect the rights of the
claimant or the safety of the "fund from fraud".
A. L. F.
PURCHASING POWER
AND UNEMPLOYMENT
An increase in wages, aimed at an expansion of
purchasing power, is a fallacious policy to the extent
that such increase results in higher price levels and
increased living costs.
Everyone will agree that to have a high level of
employment there must be a high level of produc-tion;
and that a high level of production calls for a
high level of purchasing power, which in turn means
relatively high, but of greater importance relatively
uniform, wage levels.
That this uniformity is of prime importance can
be illustrated by a simple hypothesis. Assume a
working force of 48 million with wages which are
fairly adjusted to production and living costs. One-fourth
of these workers, engaged in producing con-sumer
goods, are able, through their bargaining
power to obtain wage increases which raise total
wage payments by 50 percent.
Since wages were originally adjusted to produc-tion
costs this increase in wages must be reflected in
increased prices of consumer goods, so that the 25
percent of the workers whose wages were increased
are able to buy no more with higher wages, than be-fore
the increase, while the other 75 percent can buy
much loss. Thus, the economic balance is immedi-ately
upset. Total consumer demand does not rise
PAGE 88 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY FALL, 1945
in proportion to the theoretical increase in purchas-ing
power. In volume, it is less because of the de-creased
purchasing power of 75 percent of the
workers. Production is reduced, unemployment fol-lows,
and increases in proportion to the disparity in
wages.
The single instance in which the income of only
one segment of the labor force can be raised without
disturbing the economic equilibrium is in the case of
farm products consumed in their raw state. When
farmers receive good prices for their products the
burden of the increase falls equally on all in propor-tion
to their consumption needs, without increasing
manufacturing costs and without regard to a high
or low wage level. At the same time it increases
the purchasing power of the large agricultural popu-lation
for manufactured goods, the increased pro-duction
of which means increased employment in
industry, trade and transportation.
One important group of economists holds that
there is a wage level—a low level—at which all labor
could be employed, and they contend that high wages
are responsible for unemployment, in that unemploy-ment
results from lack of capital, which in turn is
due to the presence of too high wage rates. This is
known as the capital scarcity theory, and apparently
is based on the assumption that low wages make for
more profits, and consequently more capital which
(they assume) will be invested in increased produc-tion.
The fallacy of this theory lies in the demonstrated
fact that low wages and greater profits lead to in-creased
dividends, and often, instead of reducing ad-ministrative
and executive salaries to correspond
with reduced wage levels, it is more apt to result in
an increase of the take-off by both administrators
and executives. In this case the purchasing power
of the masses is reduced without a corresponding
reduction in price levels. Even if it should make for
increased output, it provides the opportunity for
monopolistic production, which leads to adminis-tered
rather than to wholly competitive prices.
Under such conditions the large producer during
a cyclical decline merely holds approximately to his
old price levels, and curtails production, thereby in-creasing
unemployment, and diminishing purchas-ing
power. This places the small producer under a
severe handicap, if it does not force him out of busi-ness
; for hq must sell his products purely on a com-petitive
basis when decreased purchasing power
forces him to reduce his selling price, and at the
same time reduces his ability to purchase adminis-tered
price goods that go into his production.
Organized labor, of course, contends that unem-ployment
can be prevented by the payment of higher
wages, since purchasing power is thereby increased
and greater production made necessary. If the
present disparity in wage levels could be remedied,
and an increase in wages be made to apply uniformly
to all classes of wage earners this theory would hold
water to the extent that such increase could be ab-sorbed
in production costs without raising price
levels. Beyond that point wage increases would
fail to increase purchasing power, or reduce unem-ployment
for with every increase in wages a corre-sponding
increase in prices would follow.
On the other hand, if it be assumed that the prin-ciple
of labor organization is sound for one group it
must be admitted that it is good for all groups. If
that principle be carried to its logical conclusion and
the strength of all labor be used to force wages up
as high as its bargaining power would permit it,
would only create a vicious circle in which every in-crease
in wages would necessitate a raise in the price
structure. Purchasing power, therefore, would be
no greater at high than at low wage levels.
It should be patent to all that such an increase in
wages would make competition in world markets
impossible, and such competition is necessary be-cause
of our increasing productive capacity. It
would force a reduction in output, and an increase in
unemployment without placing the wage earner in
any better position than he occupied at a lower wage
level.
On the other hand, if lowering real wages could
increase production, and thereby employment, the
same result could be achieved through a monetary
policy which raises prices ; but, according to promi-nent
economists, the supply curve of labor is not a
function of real but of money wages, and such mone-tary
manipulations are calculated to frighten busi-ness
enterprise and discourage capital. This intro-duces
the question of whether and to what extent
government should undertake to control wages and
prices. For it must be admitted that with the decay
of the laissez-faire economy some wage-price con-trol
must be substituted for the unbridled power of
organized labor to raise wages on the one hand and
the monopolistic rule of the large-scale producer on
the other, before there can be a proper relation be-tween
wages and purchasing power.
Granting that increased purchasing power is the
remedy for unemployment, the two questions which
demand the prompt consideration of government and
economic experts are (1) Shall organized labor be
allowed to enforce its demands for higher and higher
wages, with no corresponding relief for the 40 mil-lion
unorganized workers? (2) Shall larger pro-ducers
be permitted to market their products under
an administered price policy which enables them to
hold prices up regardless of reduced production
costs, while the small producer must sell his products
on a competitive basis when his own purchasing
power is reduced through administered price con-trols?
These are not questions for the layman or the
amateur, but the very fact that there is disagree-ment
among leading economists, and between eco-nomists
and organized labor as to the effect of wages
and prices on unemployment points them up as the
No. 1 and 2 problems of our postwar economy.
It is apparent, however, even to a layman, that
you can't raise the income of 10 percent of the popu-lation
to the point of increasing living costs without
reducing the purchasing power of the other 90 per-cent
of the population, which in turn means reduced
production and increased unemployment. It is like-
FALL, 1945 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 89
wise apparent that an administered price control
that maintains high price levels with a lowering of
real wages will produce the same result, and that
these two factors working together contain the
potentialities of disaster for both industry and labor.
Silas F. Campbell.
Unemployment Compensation Progress—By the States
Critics of the federal-state program of unemploy-ment
compensation generally claim that the indi-vidual
states have not done enough to broaden the
provisions of their laws so that the protection offered
workers through this insurance system kept pace
with the times. This is the basis for various bills
introduced into Congress, from time to time, with
the approval, if not at the instigation of officials of
the Federal Government, aiming to liberalize the
program and make it nationally uniform.
However, unemployment is a local community
problem even more than it is a national one. The
worker's job is localized, and any national unem-ployment
problem cannot be solved unless regular
employment is provided in the home communities.
This is the nub of the demand for public employ-ment
services geared to operate in local situations.
Let's examine the record.
The Social Security Act of 1935 did not set up the
state system of unemployment insurance, although
it was designed to assist the states to provide their
own systems in conformity with certain minimum
standards. These levels, as suggested by the Social
Security Board included : (1) coverage of employers
of eight or more workers; (2) a maximum weekly
benefit of $15 ; and (3) a maximum duration of pay-ments
of not less than 12 weeks.
Starting from there, the states began immediately
to write their laws upward. Many of the original
state .laws were broader than conformity required.
Successive legislatures have continually liberalized
the state programs of unemployment compensation
in response to their local publics. At the close of
1945 legislative sessions the over-all picture is very
different from that ten years ago. It looks like this
:
COVERAGE
Of 51 state laws (inclusive of Hawaii and the
District of Columbia), or more than half now apply
to workers for smaller establishments than those
having eight or more employees. In 16 states, the
coverage is all-inclusive, and workers for employers
or one or more have unemployment insurance pro-tection.
WEEKLY BENEFIT AMOUNT
At the present time over 50 percent of the states
(27 out of 51) pay a maximum weekly benefit of $20
or more; 11 states have an $18 weekly maximum:
—
whereas originally only three states paid more than
$15 per week and their top figure was $16.
A significant aspect of these liberalized benefits is
that the 27 states paying a maximum of $20 or more
contain more than 77.5 percent of all covered
workers. Over 90 percent of all insured workers are
in the 38 states where a weekly maximum of $18 or
more applies.
BENEFIT DURATION
32 states now provide for the payment of benefits
up to 20 weeks or more, when the unemployed
worker does not find a job sooner. These 32 states
have over 79 percent of all covered workers.
NORTH CAROLINA
This state is grouped with the liberals in respect
to providing a maximum weekly benefit payment of
$20, but it lags behind the majority in coverage by
size of firm (still eight or more) as to the duration
of payments (16 weeks only).
The larger states, with the more liberal unemploy-ment
compensation laws, generally had the greatest
concentration of war-production contracts and
workers. Therefore, the more liberal state pro-visions
apply to even larger percentages of workers
displaced following the end of the war than has been
indicated above.
After a review of what the states, as a whole,
have done to improve the unemployment compensa-tion
program, the arguments in favor of federalizing
the system as a prerequisite to liberalizing it, grow
dim. The same groups who favor outright federali-zation
have suggested also, the enactment of federal
supplementary funds. Under any such plan, the
effect would be to coerce state legislatures and state
administrators into acceptance of the views of
federal officials.
The imposition of federal standards could retard
future state action in further strengthening their
own laws ; a direction in which they have made com-mendable
progress in the past few years.
As an example of state pioneering in the field of
extending insurance protection to another type of
unemployment than that which results from eco-nomic
disruption, there is the Rhode Island Cash
Sickness Compensation Act. Under this act, a trust
fund has been established from contributions by
workers. The Unemployment Compensation Board
which administers it, pays benefits to workers, ac-cording
to the same schedule in effect for unemploy-ment
compensation, but when the reason for the
unemployment and loss of wages is temporary sick-ness
or disability. Many other states have, and are
debating similar action.
A million casualties on battle fronts; thirty-six
million casualties on the home front. Such is the
National Safety Council's report of our country's
human tragedies between Pearl Harbor Day and
V-J Day. Of our total war casualties, the record
shows 261,608 killed; the home front accident score
lists 355,000 killed.
PAGE 90 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY FALL, 1945
Veterans Create an Airline
By E. Carl Sink
A bunch of the boys were talking it up in the
ready room of Consolidated-Vultee's test pilot's bar-racks.
The times between tests were getting longer
and longer ; the war was obviously coming to a close.
It was high time to talk of many things ; of how, for
example to make a living.
They all agreed that staying in the air was proper,
and, possibly, as profitable as other things a man
could do. When the talk got around to details, then
the boys split up into groups. There were four from
North Carolina, the Teague brothers, the fellow Fly
who's gotten into Ripley with his name and his job,
and Harris, big, rawboned, a wizard at the controls.
Earl Teague was for setting up an airline in his
home state, but all were dubious that the residue of
war wages would get the line going. Their argu-ments
came to a focus with the name of another
North Stater, R. B. Babbington, Jr., of Gastonia, in-surance
man and organizer, who agreed to look into
the possibilities.
He looked, and the boys got ready to go into busi-ness
as Southeast Airlines, Inc. First, they went
to the Army Surplus Board and got lined up on fly-ing
equipment, which turned out to be scouter
Cessnas which could be converted readily into cabin
cruisers, and had engines hardly more than broken
in by Army service. The war wages went in a hurry,
for airplanes come high at any time, but they figured
they were better off than the average guy, some of
whom hadn't even salvaged their own lives from the
war effort.
Next job was the converting of the ships into five-place,
four passenger transports which would not
only come within regulations as safe flying vehicles
but also furnish a maximum of comfort to passen-gers.
This was really a job for gentlemen who had
left such menial labor to the ground crews, but they
pitched in, and ended up with two good jobs, with
never a tremor in the cords nor a vibration in the
engines. With these they established the two-a-day,
criss-cross schedules which uncover all of North
Carolina in a day, and get you back home by bed-time.
The routes were flown, the airports landed on and
found safe, before the schedules ever saw print.
That's the way the boys planned it; they had the
Army idea of doing a thing right.
Three weeks and 26,000 flying miles after the
first ship went up on the first flight, the boys and
SEA were ready for the post-war world.
This writer, with a handy cameraman in the co-pilot
seat, climbed aboard on an October Tuesday and
headed East into a rising sun. Within an hour, he
was at the coast, at Carolina Beach, 150 miles from
Raleigh. Within minutes, in which he could have
had a dip or thrown 20 casts into the booming surf,
the schedule called for the trip back, and he was at
his desk again at 10 :20, one hour and twenty minutes
from desk to desk. But that wasn't all.
Not all, by a big margin, for the next leg and the
same ship took him over twenty towns (and they are
big towns, rich towns) straight through the heart
of the Piedmont, Raleigh to Durham to Greensboro
to Winston-Salem to Charlotte. But there's some-thing
else. That last leg of the flight took out from
Charlotte and winged right straight into the moun-tains
of western North Carolina. It was a thrill ride
from end to end, although the plane, flying on
stabilizer controls, moved steadily forward and up.
The ground below erupted into little mountains, big
mountains, and then monstrosities, which, even from
above, looked like stairs to Heaven. It is the grand-est
sight-seeing in America, those mountains of Car-olina.
Which is not bad from the viewpoint of the
boys of the Test Pilot Line.
For they have the best scenery in America to see
from an angle not yet covered, and they have short
hauls through the richest industrial section of the
They reconverted. While America talked of an airborne
world, R. B. Babbington, Jr., and U. L. Fly, shown here, and
associates started a strictly North Carolina airline.
The gigantic plant of Cannon Mills is a sight worth seeing
from the air at Kannapolis.
(Photos by State News Bureau)
FALL, 1945 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 91
Southeast. They have, too, arrangements with air-ports
whereby radio tells a plane overhead if passen-ger
business is there, which means smaller port bills,
since the business is arranged on a basis of rent for
landings made. These are important things, because
you don't start an airline on a shoestring. Compara-tively,
you start an airline on strings, shoes, suit, hat
and an allowance for about eight pairs of extra
drawers.
But, definitely, the air world has come to North
Carolina with the Test Pilot's Line. The boys have
put it on the line. What will happen may be a hint
as to the fate of air enthusiasms in the brave new
world.
Vocational Training for World War Veterans
By J. Warren Smith, Secretary, State Veteran's Education Committee
The problem of veteran's education is one of the
most important of our postwar projects. Our
government by congressional acts has made ample
provision for additional education or training varied
enough to be suitable for all veterans who are eligi-ble
and will ask for assistance. Provision for this
education is made possible by two laws. Public Law
#16 provides education and training of war service
connected handicapped veterans, and Public Law
#346 makes provisions for education and training
for veterans without physical handicap. The latter
law is commonly referred to as the G.I.Bill of Rights.
This article will be limited to the below college
level vocational training of veterans or for those for
which the principal need is for educational oppor-tunities
of less than collegiate type. By data se-cured
from those now returned, we know that the
group who want vocational training will be much
larger than the group who will want college educa-tion.
Very little attention has been given to the
vocational group by the writers of the articles that
have appeared in our periodicals. Therefore, the
public seems to have a much clearer conception of
the provisions and the mechanics of securing educa-tion
as provided by colleges. For those eligible it is
important that young men who had their plans in-terrupted
by the war take advantage of the oppor-tunity
afforded them to complete their college edu-cation;
however, for those not eligible for college,
every effort should be made to furnish for them a
type of education best suited to their needs. For
many this will be school vocational training or on-the-
job training furnished by industry.
HOW MANY TO BE TRAINED
For all types of military service men and women,
white and Negro, 350,000 persons have been in-ducted
into service from North Carolina; 82%, or
287,000, will return to North Carolina. According
to estimates made by E. V. Hollis from the U. S.
Office of Education, 31/2 million of the 15 million in-ducted
from the United States (at that time) would
want some form of education. Two-thirds of this
number, or 2^3 million, will want some form of voca-tional
training. By applying the same ratio to the
number returning in North Carolina, we will be
faced with the problem of providing some form of
vocational training to 45,000 returned veterans.
More recent data than that furnished by Dr. Hollis
has proved that his estimates were too high, how-ever,
we do know that our problem is too large for
the facilities we have to furnish the training.
PHYSICALLY HANDICAPPED VETERANS
Ample provision for education or training of the
service-connected physically handicapped veteran
has been made by Public Law #16. The personnel
of the Veteran's Administration are responsible for
carrying out the provisions of this law. Every effort
must be made to make possible for a veteran who,
because of his disability, cannot continue in his
former occupation, to be trained in a new occupation
equivalent in rank and earnings to his former job.
The matter of hospitalization or physical restora-tion
for the veteran needing this type of service is
taken care of by the government before his release
to civilian status. After eligibility for training has
been established the veteran is referred to a counsel-ing
bureau for guidance. At this time the veteran's
bureau has four bureaus well staffed with experts.
The four centers are Chapel Hill, Fayetteville, Salis-bury
and Asheville. By special tests and counseling
an intelligent approach is made to the selection of a
new occupation. After the selection has been made
a veteran's training supervisor places the veteran in
a training situation. These supervisors complete all
the necessary arrangements, including an agreement
or contract with the training agency. For this public
law, prior approval by the State Veteran's Education
Committee is not necessary.
Veterans of World War II with handicaps may be
served by the Department of Vocational Rehabilita-tion,
operated by the State Department of Public
Instruction. Although the vocational rehabilitation
of civilians and veterans are provided for in separate
acts, veterans may be accepted in the civilian pro-gram,
either because the Veterans Administration
may judge that the disability is not a service-con-nected
one and therefore not covered by Public Law
#16, or if the veteran wants to elect voluntarily to
be served by the civilian program. The main point
for the veteran to know is that our government has
provided amply for his welfare. He should be en-couraged
to avail himself of the opportunities that
are his.
REGULATIONS FOR EDUCATION OR TRAIN-ING
OF VETERANS—PUBLIC LAW 346
For regulations concerning education or training
of veterans, I am inserting a quotation from Colonel
Hines. 1 This statement is easier to interpret than
the law itself.
"The Administrator of Veterans' Affairs stated on
60 Monthly Labor Review 1222 (June 1945).
PAGE 92 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY FALL, 1945
January 18, 1945, that under the Servicemen's Re-adjustment
Act of 1944, any veteran of World War
II is entitled to education or training (or a refresher
or retraining course) in an approved educational or
training institution for a period of 1 year, or for
such lesser time as may be required for the course of
instruction chosen by him. To qualify for such edu-cation
or training, the applicant must have (1) been
in active service on or after September 16, 1940, and
prior to the termination of the present war, (2) been
discharged or released "under conditions other than
dishonorable," (3) served 90 days or more, exclusive
of assigned education or training periods or (if less
than 90 days' service) been released from actual
service by reason of a service-incurred injury or
disability, and (4) must make application for and
initiate the course of education or training within
two years following discharge or release from active
service, or from the date of termination of the war,
whichever is later.
Eligibility for Education or Training Beyond One
Year.—In order to be entitled to education or train-ing
other than a refresher or retraining course be-yond
one year, satisfactory completion of such
course according to regularly prescribed standards
and practices of the institution is required.
Further it must be shown that the person's edu-cation
or training was impeded, delayed, inter-rupted,
or interfered with by reason of his entrance
into service. Such conditions are assumed as exist-ing
in the case of the person who was not more than
25 years of age at the time he entered active service
(or September 16, 1940, whichever is the later) but
must be proved by persons over 25 years of age at
the time above specified.
Veteran learning to be auto mechanic by on-the-job method.
Payment of Expenses of Veterans.—The regula-tions
issued by the Administrator make provision
for subsistence allowance and the payment of author-ized
expenses incurred by the veteran in his educa-tion
or training under the Servicemen's Readjust-ment
Act of 1944. Under this measure, expenses of
the veteran—if he is in an educational institution
—
that will be defrayed by the Government include the
"customary cost of tuition, laboratory, library,
health, infirmary, and other similar fees as are
customarily charged, and other necessary expenses
* * * as are generally required for the successful
pursuit and completion by other students in the
institution * * * or those charges which have been
approved by the Administrator of Veterans' Affairs.
Board, lodging, and other living expenses and travel
are not to be included." The Government also meets
the charges for "books, supplies, equipment, and
other necessary expenses customarily incurred for
or by any student."
If the eligible discharged serviceman selects some
type of institution other than one of an educational
character, expenses defrayed by the Government in-clude
"the charges for supplies, and other necessary
equipment customarily furnished other persons be-ing
trained by the establishment in the given trade
or position."
Full-time subsistence allowances are $50.00 per
month for men without dependents, and $75.00 per
month for those having dependents. If the veteran
is not taking a full-time course, subsistence is
measured in fractions of three-fourths, one-half, and
one-fourth of the above amount according to the
fraction that his course is of a full course. No such
allowance is to be paid when the payment is barred
because the veteran is engaged in full-time gainful
employment in a part of his course of education or
training.
When the veteran is receiving compensation for
productive labor performed as part of his appren-ticeship
or other training on the job, the amount of
subsistence plus his current monthly salary or wage
(based on the standard workweek exclusive of over-time)
shall not exceed the standard beginning
salary or wage (similarly based) payable to a
journeyman in the trade or occupation in which
training is being given."
From the above quotation we offer the following
interpretations
:
1. Refresher or retraining courses which may be
apprenticeship or on-the-job training, are open to
any honorably discharged veterans with the required
period of active service on request.
2. Veterans older than 25 at time of induction
must prove training was interrupted in order to be
eligible for more than one year of training.
3. Veterans entering upon on-the-job training
requiring less than a year to reach their objective
are eligible for subsistence for only the length of the
training period.
4. Veterans who were under 25 years of age at
the time of induction may serve a full apprenticeship
if they are making satisfactory progress at the end
FALL, 1945 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 93
of first year and have a service record long enough
to be eligible for the full period of apprenticeship.
5. Veterans in training by apprenticeship or
on-the-job training plan are eligible to be furnished
by the veterans administration supplies and other
necessary hand tools customarily furnished to other
persons being trained in peacetime.
6. It is up to the veteran, he must make his own
application for the type of education or training he
desires.
SCHOOL OR BUSINESS
APPROVED FOR TRAINING
The matter of approving schools or other institu-tions
for training rests with the different states.
Governor Broughton designated the State Depart-ment
of Public Instruction as the approval agency.
Dr. Erwin appointed from this department a com-mittee
of six, known as State Veterans' Education
Committee. The committee members are: Dr.
James E. Hillman, Chairman; J. Warren Smith,
Secretary ; Dr. J. Henry Highsmith ; Dr. N. C. New-bold;
Charles H. Warren; and C. L. Beddingfield.
This committee is charged with the responsibility
of deciding whether or not a school or other insti-tution
should be approved to participate in the
veteran's educational program. This applies to col-leges
(public or private), business schools, trade or
technical schools (public or private), and other in-stitutions
such as banks, stores, manufacturing com-panies,
garages, business or industrial concerns.
A school or business seeking approval must file an
application and include a written plan of training;
after the application and plan of training has been
received a member of the committee makes a per-sonal
inspection of the plant, then for final action
each application is reviewed by the whole committee.
If approval is given, the company or school and the
Veterans' Administration are notified.
This committee feels keenly the responsibility of
trying to be certain that the money involved will be
spent wisely and that the veteran will receive an
equitable return for his time and effort. The com-mittee
knows that it must be on the alert for appli-cations
from private schools designed to make ex-cessive
profit without rendering adequate service to
the veteran, and for industries who are not sincere
about training.
To date nearly all of our A grade colleges, a large
number of business schools, several private trade
schools, and several hundred industrial establish-ments
have been approved for training.
As the need becomes more urgent special voca-tional
public school shops will be operated for
veterans to provide short intensive training pro-grams
in subjects such as electric motor repair,
radio and electric appliance repair, general welding,
machine shop practice, automobile mechanics and
drafting.
Since the offerings in our public schools are
limited and we do not have any State Trade Schools
or private vocational or technical schools, it is im-portant
that we make optimum use of the on-the-job
or apprenticeship plan. By this plan, the number of
our places of training is limited only to the fitness of
Veteran learning to be motor repair mechanic by on-the-job
method.
the place and the willingness of the personnel of the
industry to cooperate.
APPRENTICESHIP OR
ON-THE-JOB TRAINING
If well organized, the apprenticeship or on-the-job
plan affords the best possible method to learn a
trade. For many of the skilled trades and all of the
semi-skilled occupations there is not any better place
to learn the necessary skills than on the job in the
industry. By this method the veteran will be learn-ing
under actual working conditions in the environ-ment
of the trade itself. He will be instructed on
real jobs, jobs that must be finished well enough to
be accepted by the trade. He will have as instructors
men accepted as skilled craftsmen and considered
expert. These instructors, because of their positions
in the commercial trade, will be up-to-date in the
newest developments and practical working knowl-edge
of the trade. The veteran will have the ad-vantage
of learning in a shop well equipped with
up-to-date machinery and tools, and the necessary
supplies.
The veteran, in addition to the skills, must learn
to work with others, and learn the rules of industry,
proper work habits and attitudes—these too can best
be learned in industry itself.
SUPPLEMENTARY TRAINING
On-the-job training should be supplemented by
organized class instruction. The complete learning
of a job includes manipulative skills, science, draw-ing,
math, industrial knowledge, safety and morale.
The manipulative features are learned easiest on the
job. All other features can also be learned that
PAGE 94 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY FALL, 1945
way; however, the learning process can be speeded
up by organized class instruction. This is particu-larly
true for the related technical information. For
example, the theory of the operation of a carburetor,
what makes a battery charge, or what makes a motor
run. For any group of veterans learning by on-the-job
method, the local school administrator, with the
assistance and cooperation of the Department of
Industrial Education of the State Department of
Public Instruction, will organize and operate, free of
charge, supplementary classes for any industrial
trade.
DIFFERENCE BETWEEN
JOB AND TRAINING
There is a difference between having a work job
in industry and being in training, and a large num-ber
of industries make little effort at organized
training. The worker in an industry that gives
little attention to training after acquiring an
initial skill is too often kept performing this opera-tion
for an indefinite length of time, thus he is denied
the opportunity to learn the various operations
necessary to his trade. It is the responsibility of the
committee mentioned above to determine whether it
is training or just a job the veteran will be getting
if the place of business is approved.
Training of veterans by on-the-job method will be
most apt to be successful if the following conditions
are met
:
1. The company personnel is sincere in its desire to really
train veterans.
2. A written statement of the training plan has been pre-pared
and all parties concerned with training understand
and agree to it.
3. The written statement includes a schedule of the opera-tions
to be learned, with the approximate amount of time
necessary for learning each step.
4. There is a schedule of pay with regular increases as the
learner progresses.
5. An attempt will be made to select veterans with aptitude
and interest for the different trades to be learned.
6. Skilled men with instructional ability will be designated
as instructors. It will be the duty of these instructors to
guide these veterans in their learning. They should by
telling how and by demonstration make learning easy for
these veterans.
Managers of industry in North Carolina can, if
they will, make it possible for a large number of
veterans to get excellent training in the trade of
their choice. Let's give those men the opportunity
they so justly deserve.
THE DOGWOOD FOR LUCK
HHii
Turned a Handcraft Into a Business. Stuart Nye, Asheville
War I Veteran, shown instructing an employee. Working out
simple jewelry designs, he teaches women to do the production.
Veterans of World War II who are wondering
how to recognize Dame Opportunity when they take
up civilian pursuits might be interested in the ex-perience
of Stuart Nye, veteran of World War I.
Lady Luck wears various visages, but she ap-peared
to Nye, at that time a patient in the veterans
hospital at Oteen, as a disgruntled hobbyist figura-tively
wearing a dogwood blossom. This improbable
combination threw Nye into a silversmithing busi-ness
which has risen from a $500 per year gross
enterprise into a thriving business with an annual
payroll alone of over $30,000.
Nye, while convalescing, had dabbled indifferently
with woodworking, and then one day a fellow-patient,
leaving the place, offered to sell him his
metal-working tools. Nye reluctantly bought the
stuff, and began tinkering with silver, later launch-ing
his novelty-jewelry business.
He did only moderately well until one day he
fashioned his first dogwood blossom. Instantly, the
new design caught on, and every week since then the
business has steadily increased. Pins, rings, brace-lets
and other ornaments featuring the delicate
petals became and continue a fad. Nye also worked
out pine cones, pansies and other designs, and today
his products are sold in every state and in many
foreign countries.
Nye, a pleasant, placid person, says he is as sur-prised
as anyone at the success of his business. He
scoffs at the notion that he is a creative genius. "I
made a discovery," he says. "Or rather, just in-vented
an idea. There's nothing to it—everybody's
making dogwood now."
Nevertheless, Nye's designs are widely sought
under his name and he seems not to have suffered
from competition. His production formula has been
FALL, 1945 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 95
Starting alone a few years ago, Nye now employs 30 girls who
are kept busy trying to meet demands for the silver ornaments.
All his employees learn the trade in the shop and Nye insists
it's "simple". (Photos by State News Bureau)
unchanged from the beginning. He produces only
pieces from his own original designs, and he refuses
to speed up production by introduction of machinery.
Each piece must be cut, filed, finished by hand.
Housed in a bright little workshop in his back-yard,
his workers are mostly young girls, all of them
3^ trained in the shop itself. "It's easy," Nye insists
casually. "A girl starts some simple operation, like
filing, and soon picks it up. Of course, some are
better than others."
As to the magical properties of dogwood which
he firmly believes started him on success, he has no
particular theory. "It's pretty," he says simply.
A BANKER APPRAISES THE SOUTH
(By Robert M. Hanes, of Winston-Salem, N. C, president of the Reserve City Bankers Association,
EXTRACTS FROM AN ADDRESS BEFORE A MEETING OF BUSINESS EXECUTIVES IN NEW YORK.)
No region in the nation has had such a wide
divergence of interpretation as has the South.
It has been called America's economic problem No.
1. In film and fiction it has been depicted as an area
inhabited by barefoot, pellagra ridden share crop-pers,
a land eroded by one crop farming, a section
where low wages and sub-standard educational and
living conditions prevail.
Other interpreters of the South ignore its handi-caps
and picture it as a land of golden promise with
a rich and easy harvest. They wax eloquent against
a background of mint juleps, soft flowing streams
and Stephen Foster sentiment. They, too, lack a
sense of realism.
I shall attempt here to evaluate, in terms of busi-ness
outlook, the South's problems and its opportuni-ties;
in other words, to make a banker's appraisal
of the South.
On the credit side, the South has an abundant
supply of many raw materials—cotton, tobacco,
timber, petroleum, coal, iron, natural gas, minerals,
naval stores, and a wide variety of other products.
Of the country's total production, the South ac-counts
for 95% of the cotton, 90% of the tobacco,
75% of the natural gas, 60% of the crude petroleum,
50 % of the bituminous coal, 40 % of the lumber, and
12% of the iron ore.
Turning these raw materials into finished products
has been the basis of the South's industrial progress
for decades.
While at times this progress may have seemed
somewhat slow, when we review the gains over a
period of years the figures provide some sense of
satisfaction. At the turn of the century in 1900,
total industrial production in the South was valued
at $1,564,000,000. For 1939, the last year for which
data from the Bureau of Census are available, this
figure had increased to $11,190,000,000, a gain
slightly in excess of 700%. During the same period,
the national gain was 400 %>, while states outside the
South increased 366%.
Today, 80% of the active cotton spindles are in
Southern mills and we manufacture 90% of the
nation's tobacco products.
Electric power development in the South has con-tributed
substantially to its industrial growth. In
1943, we produced 26% of all the electric power out-put
in the country, including both water power and
power from fuels.
In 1943 the South accounted for 40% of the
national farm crop income.
In 1900 the South's cotton crop brought $370,-
000,000; in 1943, $1,322,000,000. Our tobacco crop
of 1900 sold for $40,000,000 ; in 1943, $514,000,000.
Of special significance is the South's financial pro-gress.
In 1910 the banking resources of this region
were only $3,275,000,000 ; today they are more than
$23,000,000,000. Savings deposits in the same period
have increased from $575,000,000 to $3,500,000,000.
Life insurance in force increased from 3!/2 billions
to more than 30 billions.
One of the South's leading natural advantages is
its climate. It is a land of mild temperatures,
relatively free from extremes of heat and cold, with
ample rainfall and an abundance of sunshine
throughout the year. This provides a long growing
season for agriculture and attracts workers and
others who seek relief from the rigors of harsher
climates in other regions.
The South's white population is composed largely
of native-born stock, direct descendants of the early
independent, pioneer settlers, almost wholly pure
Anglo-Saxon.
It is a homogenous population. It is predomi-nately
rural and therefore possesses those inbred
characteristics of stability and resourcefulness so
valuable in the development of industrial enter-prises.
Although not highly skilled, it has been con-clusively
demonstrated that Southern labor can
readily be taught skilled trades.
Our people are not crowded together in large
cities, but scattered in smaller cities and towns
PAGE 96 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY FALL, 1945
where living and working conditions are more at-tractive.
The South has few metropolitan cities ; it
has thousands of small towns whose people are sup-ported
partly by industry and trade, and partly by
agriculture. This pattern fits perfectly into the
current trend of dispersal of large industries.
The South has excellent transportation facilities.
Today 81,473 miles of railway lines crisscross the
Southern states. We pioneered in the development
of concrete highways, and now approximately
350,000 miles of modern highways spread through-out
the South. Twenty-one airlines serve this re-gion
and supply direct connections with other routes
throughout the nation and overseas. Through our
excellent ports and harbors and our inland water-ways
flows a steady stream of domestic and foreign
commerce.
Now let's look at the debit side—some of the
South's problems and needs.
We have relied too much on one crop—cotton—in
our agriculture and have not had sufficient diversi-fication
in industry. Too much reliance on the grow-ing
of cotton and tobacco and the processing of these
raw materials has made us too vulnerable to sudden
market changes affecting these products. The result
has been that farmers in normal times have had to
sell much of their cotton and tobacco in an unpro-tected
world market and buy much of their food,
machinery and clothing in a well protected domestic
market.
The freight rate structure, which for many years
favored producers in the East at the expense of
Southern producers and shippers, has undoubtedly
greatly retarded the South's development.
Nothing has happened in the past 50 years of such
tremendous significance as the recent decision of the
Interstate Commerce Commission to correct those
freight rate inequities. The beneficial results will
not appear immediately, but in the next five to ten
years this change in freight rates will greatly stimu-late
Southern progress.
It will mean that the nation's great distributing
and merchandising companies will establish more
distribution centers throughout the South, and
finished products from Southern plants will move to
markets throughout the nation on an equal basis
with products from other sections of the country.
The trend towards the South, which has been evident
now for some years, will be greatly accelerated by
this momentous decision.
The South has not produced enough foodstuffs and
clothing to supply the needs of its own region, thus
necessitating the more expensive procedure of bring-ing
in these basic supplies from distant sources.
If the South is to provide a broader market for its
own products, it must continue to raise the average
per capita income of its people.
To meet the challenge of the future, I believe we
shall need more business and industrial leadership,
constantly improving management, to help develop
our resources and opportunities.
We also need many more technically trained men.
We have produced our share of leaders and tech-nicians,
but many of them were so good that they
were lured away to responsible positions in other
sections of the country. We must provide full op-portunity
for our own young men and also import
leadership from other sections to broaden our busi-ness
viewpoint and add new types of experience.
These are some of our problems and needs. There
are others, but I believe that most of them are re-lated
to these main points.
Recently there have been unmistakable trends and
developments which give an entirely new color to
the picture of the South, factors which can greatly
accelerate its progress.
The impact of war upon the South is of particular
significance.
In the four years ending June 30, 1944, $5,187,-
000,000 had been spent in Southern states for war
production facilities alone—plants, shipyards, tools,
etc. This does not include other billions spent for
airports, camps, and purely military. installations.
WAR CONTRACTS
During the same period war supply contracts
awarded in the South totaled $25,532,402,000. They
included ships, plans, guns, shells, ammunition, ex-plosives,
high-octane gasoline, textiles, synthetic
rubber, food, paper and pulp, steel, aluminum and
cement, to name some of the more important items.
There has been a substantial accumulation of re-serves,
savings, and war bonds by industry, business
and individuals throughout the South.
The intensified need for foods and raw materials
has forced improved methods, diversification and in-tensive
cultivation in agriculture.
Farm mortgage debt has been greatly reduced, the
use of more farm machinery has been stimulated and
the farmer has been obliged to learn new techniques
and better farm management.
Farming in the South is rapidly getting away
from the one cash crop system and in the future we
shall produce more of our own foodstuffs, especially
poultry, eggs and a wide variety of dairy products.
The war production program has brought new and
diversified industry to the South, developing a large
supply of skilled labor. This has been one of our
great needs—the training of labor in high precision
work.
In the textile field the South once had the reputa-tion
for producing largely coarse goods and low
quality products. This picture has changed ma-terially
in recent years as many refinements and im-provements
have been made in our textile industry.
For example, we have one producer in North
Carolina making fine combed yarn with counts as
high as 160, which is probably the finest yarn made
in this country.
Many of our mills are already placing orders for
improved machinery and equipment when available.
There is a substantial program now under way for
the expansion and improvement of rayon weaving
facilities and the enlargement and refinement of
spun rayon production. There is also taking place
FALL, 1945 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 97
an expansion of woolen yarn and woolen fabric pro-duction.
In furniture manufacturing we have many plants
turning out high quality furniture products, and we
have demonstrated that these products will compete
in durability and appearance with high grade furni-ture
made in any other section of the country.
The paper and pulp industry is moving South
where it has been attracted by huge supplies of raw
materials and favorable working conditions. In
1943 we produced 47% of the nation's wood pulp and
26% of its paper and paperboard. While much of
this production is in the coarser paper goods made
from our pine forests, other types of paper mills are
being developed in the South. We have a notable
example of this in the Ecusta Paper Corporation in
North Carolina which now supplies nearly all of the
cigarette paper for the nation and in addition makes
high grade writing papers.
There has been a tremendous shifting of the
hosiery industry to the South. In the past 10 or 15
years many plants from the middle Atlantic belt
have moved into the South, and there has been a
dramatic development of new plants within the area,
many of which started with two to five knitting
machines.
The South is rapidly overcoming its handicap in
education, research and technical training. For ex-ample,
in 1910 the South spent $80,000,000 for
public schools. In 1943 it spent $511,000,000. There
is much yet to be accomplished, but we are making
rapid progress in raising our educational standards.
Of special interest to industry is the establishment
of excellent facilities for the technical training of
young men to operate and manage industrial plants.
There are now being established at the North Caro-lina
State College of Agriculture and Engineering,
three foundations—the Textile, the Dairy and the
Agricultural Foundations—Which will do much to
broaden our technical training.
In the field of research we are also making out-standing
progress.
There will be ample bank credit available to meet
all sound industrial credit needs in the South during
the reconversion period. We have in recent years
developed many sizeable regional banks which work
closely with local community banks, thus providing,
through correspondent relationships, a combination
of financial resources adequate for all needs.
As a special aid to small business, credit groups
are being formed throughout the country under the
leadership of the American Bankers Association.
The combined credit being offered by groups already
formed in the South totals over $250,000,000 and the
amount is being continually increased.
Summarizing this appraisal, the South has made
great progress. We still have far to go to equal the
economic attainments of some other regions, but I
venture to predict that the rate of progress in the
South during the next decade will equal or surpass
that of any other section. I, therefore, leave with
you the slogan of one of our great southern rail-roads,
"Look Ahead—Look South!"
U.C. C. CHIEF LOOKS TO
NORTH CAROLINA'S FUTURE
A newspaper man asked me not so long ago what
was going to happen in North Carolina during re-conversion.
I answered that in so far as North
Carolina's textile, tobacco, hosiery and furniture in-dustries
are concerned, any displacement of labor
would be temporary and that steady employment
over a long period of time is fairly certain. Recon-version
to goods for civilian use, of which there is a
distressing shortage throughout the world, will take
only a few days for our textile plants. Tobacco,
furniture and wood-working plants generally have
no problems at all. If the old world can be kept on
an even keel, North Carolina will be all right.
In the matter of establishments that may be classi-fied
as 100 percent war plants, we experienced the
effects of mass lay-offs. About 16,000 people were
laid off in North Carolina after the announcement
of the end of the Japanese War. Most of these
people have found jobs among us somewhere, and it
is my hope that North Carolina industry can absorb
the rest of them.
But as has been pointed out, industry should not
be called upon to absorb all ex-war workers, includ-ing
boys and girls of high school age; housewives
who had never worked before and should now go
back to home-making and many older workers who
were called back to machine and work bench for the
emergency and who should now take retirement.
In every community where one of the war plants
mushroomed into vast proportions over-night and
collapsed just as suddenly, there is considerable fear
and uncertainty. In over a dozen North Carolina
communities great factories, filled with expensive
machinery, stand idle. There is no sign of life
around them, except for passing watchmen or care-takers.
One Of the biggest of these plants, with over
7,000 workers a few weeks ago, has three people in
the office, three watchmen and six mechanics.
What to do with these great plants is a problem.
Left vacant, everybody knows what will happen. In
a year, stones from the hands and sling-shots of
boys will have smashed most of the windows and the
fine buildings will be the haunts of rats and bats.
It seems to me that our Department of Conser-vation
and Development and our State Planning
Board ought to be thinking and planning to make
use of these buildings and of as much of their
machinery as can be used for peace-time production.
I think we should encourage the establishment of
small shops, manufacturing the tools and gadgets
that North Carolina buys in such huge quantities.
One of these huge war plants might easily be con-verted
into 20 or more such small establishments,
all offering gainful employment to skilled mechanics
and profitable enterprises for men of business and
executive ability.
Let's not wait for "Big Business" from the out-side
to come in and take over these big plants. Let's
take them over ourselves for the establishment of a
vast number of small industries so badly needed
right now.
A. L. Fletcher.
PAGE 98 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY FALL, 1945
THE TRAVEL INDUSTRY
Before the war, travel ranked high among the
major industries of the United States. The vacation
and business travel dollar had become an important
factor in state and national economy. But the
travel industry became a war casualty, with the
many restrictions that were necessary. However,
vacation travel is now due for a boom. In fact this
has already started, with more people planning to
go farther afield, to spend more money and to take
more time, or more frequent vacation and business
trips.
To arrive at some measure of the relative im-portance
of the travel industry to North Carolina,
one has to refer to pre-war figures. Looking back
to the year 1938, it appears that tourist travel in
North Carolina yielded $64,350,000, according to a
National Park Service report. This is a dollar crop
of more than $5,000,000 a month—double the value
of the cotton crop and over one-third the value of the
tobacco crop.
Everyone in North Carolina benefited from this
money as it went into immediate circulation through
filling stations, restaurants, hotels, tourist homes,
merchants, and other trade channels. If such a sum
as $64 millions could have been set aside in a special
fund, it would have operated the schools in the state
for more than two years. There would have been
more than enough to operate all state governmental
activities, including schools, institutions and depart-ments
for one year and still leave a balance of $25
millions.
The accepted standard for estimating tourist
travel showed that at least 1,750,000 persons spent
an average of $6.00 per day in North Carolina in
1939. Supposing one-half of this was spent at buy-ing
at retail, a conservative estimate, approximately
$1,000,000 went into the state general fund from
sales taxes alone.
Immediately prior to the war, the state's travel
industry was increasing rapidly. This is evidenced
by the fact that in 1941, there was an increase in
gasoline tax revenue of 39.8 percent, over the year
1937, although the national increase in gasoline con-sumption
during the same period was listed as 14.6
percent. North Carolina collected $8,655,696 more
in gasoline taxes in 1941 than it did in 1937. The
difference between what the state would have col-lected
on a national average and what it actually
netted—nearly $6,000,000—must be credited to the
larger increase in travel in North Carolina.
Similar indicators are found in the increase in
non-resident hunting and fishing licenses, and in the
recorded number of visitors to national park and
forest areas. Between 1937 and 1941, out-of-state
hunting and fishing licenses rose 85 percent. In
1937 there were 727,243 visitors to the Great Smoky
Mountains National Park, but in 1941 there were
1,247,919; while visitors to the Pisgah and Nanta-hala
Forests increased 600 and 280 percent re-spectively.
HOTELS
In spite of the war's restrictions on travel gen-erally,
the state's hotel business did not suffer
materially during the war. Many of the larger re-sort
hotels were taken over and operated by the
Federal Government for the quartering of military
and diplomatic personnel; and a relatively small
number of the seasonal resorts located in out of the
way places were forced to close. Most of the hotels
in North Carolina, however, have been crowded to
capacity throughout the war years. With the large
number of Army and Marine camps located in the
state, servicemen on furlough and their visiting
families more than filled available accommodations.
Most communities, in fact, were called upon through
U. S. O. offices to furnish lodgings in private homes
when the hotels just could not take any more guests.
This situation is reflected in the reports on em-ployment
made to the Unemployment Compensation
Commission. In 1941, there were 134 hotel estab-lishments,
operating with eight or more workers for
at least 20 weeks in the year, reporting an average
total employment of 4,033 persons. In the first year
of the war, only 115 hotels reported 3,795 employed
in various services. But by 1944, with no resort
hotels reporting to the Commission, the number of
establishments filing returns had increased to 141,
and their employees to 4,875. These people received
in wages a total of $4,471,901.00 last year.
Taken altogether, these facts amply bear out the
statement of a leading North Carolina editor : "The
travel industry of North Carolina is of the utmost
economic importance. It provides employment for
thousands of persons. It directly determines the
prosperity of many Tar Heel communities. It con-tributes
substantially to the support of the state and
local governments."
Bringing in the baggage—here we have a "Bell-hoppess".
FALL, 1945 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 99
Tourism is Big Business
By Felix A. Grisette, Managing Director North Carolina State Planning Board
The tourist industry is big business.
Competent students of the industry estimate that
it offers a potential yield of $150,000,000 annually in
North Carolina. The magnitude of this income can
best be appreciated by remembering that the com-bined
cash receipts from all livestock and livestock
products in North Carolina during 1944 was only
$107,000,000, or that the total value of all sales of
the North Carolina cotton crop was less than $85,-
000,000.
There are two widespread fallacies about the travel
business which should be corrected in the public
mind. One is that the cash income derived from
tourists is limited to a very few agencies, such as
hotels, restaurants, and filling stations. The other
is that the whole business is thought of in terms of
a pastime or as an appendage to some pleasure
rather than as an industry in itself.
It should not require any considerable knowledge
of economics to realize that any such sum as $150,-
000,000 annually, when turned loose in a state, will
benefit far more people than any very few businesses.
This money will be equally as valuable to the entire
economy of all the people as any other industry with
an equal volume of revenue. With an adequate pro-gram
of overall state promotion, the entire State
can benefit from this volume of travel business. Gen-erally
speaking, travelers on vacation do not go to
any one specific point, but to a section or region.
There is every reason to assume that the visitor
going to the mountains can also be persuaded to
visit the sandhills and the coastal areas. Obviously,
while going from one point to the other within the
State, the traveler leaves his expenditures all along
the way.
Clearly, an industry with such possibilities should
not be thought of in terms of play.
It is equally clear that any industry holding forth
such possibilities will be the object of keen compe-tition
between different states and sections of the
country. North Carolina must be prepared to obtain
its fair share of this business.
The State Planning Board, in line with its policy
of recommending courses of action in terms of the
needs of the people, more than a year ago asked
ex-Governor J. Melville Broughton to appoint a
Tourist-Travel Committee to advise with the Board
and to coordinate the efforts of all interests con-cerned
with travel. The following persons were
appointed
:
Coleman W. Roberts, Chairman
Thomas H. Briggs D. Hiden Ramsey
H. S. Gibbs Charles E. Ray, Jr.
Felix A. Grisette, Ex-offi- Bill Sharpe
cio, Secretary Richard S. Tufts
Robert I. Lee Lionel Weil
J. B. McCoy
As the committee studied the situation, it became
increasingly obvious that a state-wide, non-govern-mental
agency should be created to work with the
Department of Conservation and Development and
others concerned. Accordingly, the establishment
of an organization to be known as the North Carolina
Travel Council was recommended. This recommen-dation
received favorable reactions from all inter-ests
directly concerned with the travel industry,
with the result that plans are now under way for
completing the organization of the Council.
As now proposed, the Council shall be an organi-zation
of those agencies serving the traveling pub-lic
in the State of North Carolina, and shall be de-voted
to the improvement and development of all
phases of the industry within the State.
The Council shall represent the best interests of
its members in all matters pertaining to the welfare
of the travel industry as a whole and shall, through
exchange of information, educational campaigns and
by other means endeavor to improve the services of-fered
to the traveling public by the industry, and to
expand and develop these facilities as may be needed
to meet demand, and shall cooperate with established
promotional and advertising groups such as motor
clubs, travel agencies, chambers of commerce, the
North Carolina Department of Conservation and De-velopment,
etc.
There shall be two classes of membership : Active
and associate. Associate members shall be those
companies, organizations or businesses operating pri-marily
to serve the traveling public and any who may
be so classified shall be eligible for membership.
The principal financial support of the Council's ac-tivities
shall be from the various dues paid by asso-ciate
members, the amounts of such dues to be fixed
by the directors, but associate members shall have no
voting rights in the Council, nor shall they hold of-fice
in the Council.
Active members shall be elected by the Board of
Directors and shall be limited to individuals who are
officers or employees or other designated represen-tatives
of a company or organization which is an
associate member of the Council. At all general
meetings of the Council each active member shall be
entitled to one vote, and all officers and directors of
the Council shall be active members. Dues for ac-tive
members shall be $10.00 per year for each per-son.
Three members of the 15-member board of direc-tors
have already been named: Former Governor
Broughton, representing the East ; Coleman Roberts,
representing the West ; and Richard S. Tufts, repre-senting
the Central section of the State. These three
members have also been authorized to serve as a
nominating committee to select the remaining mem-bers
for presentation to the incorporators of the
Council. Ex-Governor Broughton is preparing the
necessary legal documents incident to obtaining a
charter.
Thus, North Carolina is on the way in a program
to develop this potentially powerful industry for the
benefit of all the people of the State.
PAGE 1 00 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY
FALL, 1945
Room clerk registers a new-comer.
Long established as a travel state, North Carolina
currently sees prospects of doubling its tourist trade
in immediate years.
The travel situation had remained somewhat static
until 1936 when the Great Smoky Mountains
National Park was opened. Until then, the Blue
Ridge country, headquartered at Asheville, had been
the traditional summering place of a steadily grow-ing
number of midwesterners, southerners, a few
northerners.
The new national park, embracing the little- known climax of the Appalachian system, quickly
climbed m favor, and in 1941 was the most popular
park m America, outstripping Shenandoah by a
substantial margin. Returns from the tourist busi-ness
rose from an estimated $35,000,000 in 1936 to
an estimated $175,000,000 in 1941.
Future trade prospects have been enhanced by
the fact that Cape Hatteras National Seashore,
authorized by Congress, is due for development
within the next few years. At the same time, the
Blue Ridge Parkway, America's first "highway
park with many links already open, will be com-pleted
within an estimated three years. Resumption
of Paul Green s famous "Lost Colony" is expected to
stimulate travel into northeastern North Carolina
Other major state and federal-supported travel- enticmg projects have been approved.
WESTERN NORTH CAROLINA
Western North Carolina already is a well-known
playground, with varied resorts and a large summer children s camp industry. Substantial developments
are planned for postwar years. The Park Service
Memo on Tra
By Bill Sh>
has recently announced plans for new roads giving; more convenient access to the Great Smokies Park
Additional camp and trailer grounds and lodge ac- commodations are contemplated.
The TVA program has changed the face of many western North Carolina communities, where sky-blue
lakes are filling mountain coves. While TVA itself plans no recreational developments, it is coop-erating
with local, state and federal agencies to
utilize advantages offered by the lakes. Recently,
the Park Service acquired additional land for the
Great Smokies so that new Fontana Dam will pro-vide
a shoreline for part of the park, with oppor-tunities
for lake fishing, bathing, boating in the
heart of the Smokies. Towns and counties are ac-quiring
park rights along TVA shorelines, with
S-vT 5* dev
f
loPment- Through agreement IV with A, the Park Service plans a new highway from
Fontana Dam to Bryson City, providing a new park
entrance.
A PARK 500 MILES LONG
Most spectacular development in western North
Carolina will be the Blue Ridge Parkway, which was
started several years ago. With several stretches
already muse, the completed parkway eventually
will join Shenandoah and Great Smoky Mountain
rarks. It is difficult to describe adequately this
pleasure boulevarde to one who has not driven it Rights of way have been acquired on each side so
that there are no disturbing commercial elements in
S 7^° SlgnS
'
hot dog stands> souvenir peddlers
if or 500 miles one can ride over an easily graded,
softly curved highway which soars with the ridges
at an average altitude of 3,000 feet. Designed for
pleasure and not for engineering utility, the Park- way bores through mountains, across great fills over
valleys, winds miles away from "practical" routes
to bring the traveller to breath-taking views. Along
the route are bulges which will provide rest facilities
—picnic areas, turn-outs, overlooks, and other con-veniences
and pleasures.
The National Park Service once estimated the Parkway would handle 3,000,000 tourists a year.
North Carolina officials think postwar travel de- mands will up that figure by another million.
The Parkway will take visitors through the upper
Blue Ridge Country into the Grandfather region on
past Mt. Mitchell, thence to Craggy Gardens, past
Asheville into the Pisgah and westward, through
boco Gap into Indian land, and so on to Clingman's
Dome, highest peak in the Smokies.
NATIONAL FORESTS
A large part of Western North Carolina lies
within the purchase and development areas of the
National Forest Service. In both Pisgah and
Nantahala National Forests, recreational areas have
been completed and are open. Especially in the
Sapphire country, along Rt. 64, are camping, swim-
FALL, 1945 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 101
North Carolina
te News Bureau
ming, fishing, picnicking areas, and more are due to
be opened. Managed fishing and hunting are per-mitted
on thousands of acres of these public lands.
More vacation spots are being made accessible by
a network of state park and forest roads, and places
denied the wheeled visitor also have been opened up
by a system of marked and graded trails. In the
Smokies alone are 500 miles of these trails, forming
a great outdoor communication system for the hiker
or horseback rider. In Pisgah and Nantahala, the
Forest Service has also developed a trail system
which is used extensively. The Appalachian Trail,
which is marked from Maine to Georgia, follows the
highest ridges of North Carolina, with log lean-to
shelters spotted a day's journey apart, with firewood,
water and toilet, and other facilities nearby. Several
dude ranches have been established to take ad-vantage
of the outdoor areas. An active youth
hostel loop is in operation.
EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA
North Carolina beaches in the past largely have
been patronized by upstate Tar Heels. In the last
few years, however, sportsmen have discovered the
good fishing grounds lying at the capes and off the
banks, and the excellent waterfowl shooting at famed
Mattamuskeet and Currituck, and elsewhere.
A few years ago, the National Park Service, after
a survey, selected the Banks of North Carolina as
the site for the first National seashore park. The
area would extend from Currituck bank to Ocracoke
Inlet, and would comprise eventually some 100,000
acres, much of it on unspoiled beaches or sound
fronts.
The State of North Carolina has created a Sea-shore
Commission to acquire the necessary land.
In the area—one of the most romantic and iso-lated
in this country—lies Kill Devil Hill, Fort
Raleigh, Cape Hatteras, and other historic points.
The Park would take in most of the Outer Banks
—
jutting 30 miles into the Atlantic, with Pamlico
Sound on its back—and comprise one of the greatest
sport fishing areas in America. Here loll the cop-pery
channel bass, the flashy dolphin, the amber-jack,
bonita, the fighting Hatteras blue, as well as a
host of good panfish—mackerel, trout, flounder,
sheepshead.
The banks will soon get an "experimental" road
from Oregon Inlet to Hatteras—forerunner, per-haps,
of a hardsurface highway. Bridges across
Alligator River and Croatan Sound, to make the
park area more accessible, are contemplated by the
State.
But more than shorebirds, fishing and surf-bath-ing
are contemplated. Paul Green's symphonic
drama, "Lost Colony", presented at open air Water-side
Theatre on Roanoke Island each summer until
1941, is to be revived. Former Governor Broughton
heads a committee to raise $100,000 to rebuild the
theatre.
In the kitchen of Pinnacle Inn.
Presented nightly from July 1 to Labor Day, "Lost
Colony" is an outdoor spectacle performed in a
unique theatre where scene shifting is done through
use of lights and different stage levels. Over 150
persons are in the cast. From 1937 to 1941 the play
attracted 400,000 spectators.
Nearby is historic Kill Devil Hill, surmounted by
the Wright Memorial. Now it is planned to bring
the original Wright plane back to the site of its first
flight and to house it in a suitable building, where
it will be another attraction of the Seashore park.
Also planned: a Coast Guard Museum; fishermen's
cabins at the cape ; a bicycle trail.
North Carolina is talking of more things for the
traveller. Recently, the Department of Conserva-tion
and Development accepted the offer of a
generous woman who proposes to restore Tryon's
Palace at New Bern, on Trent and Neuse Rivers.
Only one wing of the original palace, once called "the
most beautiful building in America," is now stand-ing,
but the original plans have been discovered, and
rebuilding of the royal governor's palace will com-mence
as soon as possible. $300,000 already has been
made available ; $500,000 or more eventually will be
expended for the restoration which will be one of
the show places of America. The state has appro-priated
$100,000 to acquire adjacent land for the
project.
STATE PARKS
Resumption of state park services, now largely
curtailed, with expansion of facilities, and the addi-tion
of other areas has been recommended. Cabins,
to be rented for moderate fees, are to be erected at
PAGE 1 02 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY
FALL, 1945
J
Waitress takes the luncheon order.
: '': -K ',
Caring for hotel grounds. This girl took on a man's job
during the war.
Chambermaid on duty at mountain resort.
the parks and a lodge with cabins attached is Planned at Mt. Mitchell State Park, atop eastern America's highest peak.
Cabins also are planned at Mt. Morrow and Hang- iB
p^ At Pettigrew State Park, on Lake 16,000-acre Phelps m eastern Carolina, the Pettigrew plan-tation
home has already been restored, and the 16- room mansion will be available to vacationists and sport fishermen who come to the lake for the fine
iTn^t r? ^n§
- F°rt Macon
' on the banks
opposite Beaufort, is now occupied as a military in-stallation
but plans for its conversion into a State Beach will be resumed after the war. Cape Hat
teras State Park, with its modern cabins for surf
fishermen, will be incorporated in the National Sea- shore area.
STATE LAKES
North Carolina owns a chain of clear-water lakes m eastern Carolina, and some of these already are m use Smgletary Lake, a beautiful cypress-shaded
body of water now is used for group camping, and has dining halls, cabins and shelters. Jones Lake nearby, has been set aside as a resort for Negroes' The government recently turned Crabtree Creek
area over to the state, and the 80 cabins there are
available the year around for vacationists. The
legislature authorized the parks division to take over
Cliffs of the Neuse, near Goldsboro, as a riverside
and developed
6
" *** "^^^^* Mquired
SANDHILLS
The oldest winter resort country in North Caro- line—the gandhil! pine lands—have been partly
occupied by the military, but all hotels now have been returned to private operation, and this winter
golf capital of America, noted for its five so]f courses at Pinehurst and Southern Pines, and for its fox hunting, quail, and horse activities, are open in winter Full programs, including the many golf and tennis tournaments and the well-known steeplechase,
will be resumed.
HUNTING AND FISHING
Anticipating an unprecedented crop of outdoor
enthusiastics returning to normal civilian life, North Carolina is seriously concerned with the prob- lem of providing game. On federal-state wild-life management areas a large program of stocking of
fish and game is being carried out. Deer are trapped m over-populated areas and released in other sec-tions.
An attempt now is being made to return deer
to the Piedmont area, where they long since had been shot out. Hatcheries are restocking streams On management areas, public bear, deer and boar
hunts are held. An extensive game and fish propa-gation
program is being blue-printed.
STATE AID
+>1
T
!;
e State of North Carolina is backing plans of the National Forest Service, the Park Service, TVA
Sam
Pn
Tfc
te dr?TY
?
ln thG P0Stwar travel P™:
grain, ine state highway department's large and growing surplus will be thrown into a large postwar
FALL, 1945 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 1 03
highway construction program. Roads will be
widened, and new highways built to make attractive
spots more accessible.
A new two-way road, running from the Blue
Ridge Parkway to the summit of Mt. Mitchell al-ready
has been approved. A road now crosses Lake
Mattamuskeet, and the banks will be brought within
the range of new bus lines by bridges across Alli-gator
River and Croatan Sound. A road is now
being roughed out to Hatteras. Long ago, the state
made all bridges toll-free, and also operates general
toll-free ferries.
The state's Advertising Division estimates that
postwar travel in North Carolina will amount to
nearly half a billion dollars a year, making the state
among the leaders in travel volume. A subcommittee
has been named to interest capital in building more
resorts to meet the anticipated demands of a travel-hungry
nation. The State Planning Board is coop-erating
in the enterprise.
HOTEL SERVICES
Basic to the travel industry are the types of
service rendered by hotel employees. The pictures
which accompany this article were taken by Mr.
Hemmer of the State News Bureau to illustrate such
services. These show summer activities at Pinnacle
iiiiiiii -': :';:-:
.
.
' ..: v.
f;
: v;v"
Life-guard at Wildcat Lake.
Inn, which is a unique resort in that during the
winter months it is in reality Lees-McRae College.
During the summer season the college buildings
provide hotel accommodations, and the students
render all the service operations as part of a self-help
program.
TIPS AS WAGES
Up until March 6, 1945, the Commission had a
great deal of trouble in trying to get reports from
operators of hotels and restaurants and similar estab-lishments,
upon the tips received by bellboys, wait-resses
and other such employees. For the last few
months before the 6th of March, and for the months
between the 6th of March and the 1st of July, the
traveling auditors examined a great many accounts.
Sometime in the winter of 1945 a committee of hotel
keepers and their attorney, Mr. J. C. B. Ehringhaus,
appeared before the Commission in an effort to find
some fair and equitable way to tax employers on tips
received by their employees.
The discussion was both pro and con, and the
Commission finally determined that it was so diffi-cult
to account for tips that it could not fairly tax
the employers for tips received by employees, so
the Commission passed the following regulation
:
Rule 2. Gratuities: (A) Any gratuities custo-marily
received by an individual in the course of his
work from persons other than his employing unit
shall be treated as wages paid such individual and
shall be added to any other remuneration paid to
such individual by such employing unit for the pur-pose
of preparing reports required by and in calcu-lating
the contributions due the Unemployment
Compensation Commission ; provided, such gratuities
are reported by such individual to the employing
unit on forms prescribed by the Commission and fur-nished
to the individual by the employing unit, with-in
three days after the end of the pay period in
which received.
(B) If the employing unit deems the amount of
gratuities reported in accordance with Section (A)
of this rule to be unreasonable or excessive, the em-ploying
unit shall include such amount in his reports
to the Commission under protest, and any protest so
made shall be investigated and determined in such
manner as the Commission may prescribe.
(C) Neither this rule nor any regulation or in-struction
issued pursuant thereto is to be construed
as authorizing any employing unit to demand of any
individual performing services for it a report or ac-counting
of gratuities received, or to require such in-dividual
to render such report or accounting. If any
individual fails to report gratuities received as pro-vided
in Section (A) of this rule, however, such
gratuities shall not be considered as wages, except
on a showing of good cause to the Commission within
45 days of the end of the applicable pay period for
such failure to report such gratuities.
This will permit the bellboys and waitresses and
others receiving gratuities in the performance of
their duties to make reports to their employers. The
employers will then have to include such amounts
in their quarterly wage reports to the Commission
and will have to pay contributions upon these
amounts. The employees receiving tips and gratui-ties
will thus have these credits to their wage rec-ords
and included in subsequent calculation as to the
amount of weekly benefits to be paid them if unem-ployed.
The Commission thought that this was the fairest
way out of a very difficult situation. The hotel men,
restaurant keepers and others employing people who
receive tips or gratuities, agreed with the Commis-sion.
This regulation went into effect July 1, 1945.
C. U. HARRIS.
PAGE 104 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY FALL, 1945
READJUSTMENT PROBLEMS
From now on, thousands of workers in North
Carolina, and millions throughout the country, will
be changing jobs. Skills learned in wartime may be
of little use to them in the peacetime economy. Jobs
may develop in places far from the cities or town
where they now live. They may work shorter hours,
and their take-home pay may be less.
Unemployment compensation will help many of
them to bridge the gap between jobs. But unem-ployment
compensation is not a subsidy for idleness.
It can be paid only to workers who are seeking jobs
they cannot find.
Our law in North Carolina, like those of other
states, has safeguards to prevent payment of bene-fits
to people who do not want to work or who are
unable to work. But in the present situation, ad-ministrators
are faced with many questions in de-termining
whether an individual is eligible for
benefits.
Refusing suitable work, being unavailable for
work or unable to work, and quitting a job volun-tarily,
are the three principal reasons for disquali-fying
a worker. Following are some of the basic
questions of policy that will have to be decided
:
1. What is suitable work? Should "suitability"
be determined as a job for which a person is qualified
by recent experience, or should it be related to a
worker's pre-war job or should both recent and
earlier experience be considered in the light of what
jobs are available?
Examples
:
A mechanic who earned $1.80 an hour during the
war is offered a job at 65 cents an hour. If he re-fuses
it, should he be denied unemployment in-surance
benefits?
A drug store clerk has become a skilled machine
operator in a war plant and his wages have
amounted to about $80 a week. After he is laid off,
he is offered a job as a clerk at $20 a week. If he
refuses it, should he be disqualified for unemploy-ment
insurance benefits, or should he be given time
to look around for a job in his line at higher pay?
Many women took industrial jobs during the war.
Some of them will want to return to homemaking,
but some will want to continue to work. If they are
laid off, what sort of work should be considered
"suitable" for them? Should they be required to
take housework or other work at much lower pay if
factory jobs cannot be found?
If jobs at high pay are not available, how much
time will unemployed persons be given to appraise
the situation before being offered whatever work is
available, or denied benefits?
2. When is a worker able to work and available
for work? Must he be able to take any job regard-less
of its physical requirements? Must he be avail-able
for work on any shift, regardless of home con-ditions?
How far from home must the worker be
willing to go, to be considered available for work?
Examples:
A 58-year-old man is laid off his war job. The
only work to be had involves heavy lifting. Should
he be disqualified for unemployment insurance bene-fits
because he is unable to take the job, because he
cannot do heavy lifting?
A woman is laid off from a plant in her home
town. The only work to be had is 35 miles away, in
another town. She cannot adjust her household
schedule to include the 3-hour travel time involved in
taking such a job. Should she be considered un-available
for work and denied benefits?
3. Should a worker be disqualified if he quits his
job voluntarily for good personal cause? In North
Carolina, if a worker quits his employment for a
reason not connected with the work or the employer,
he forfeits benefit payments for from 4 to 12 weeks.
Example:
A widow quits her job to take care of a sick child
at home. When the child is well and going back to
school, should she be denied her unemployment in-surance
benefits while looking for another job?
Suitable Work In the Post-War Period
By Irene M. Zaccaro, Referee for Unemployment Compensation Board of Maryland
The question of what is suitable work can be ap-proached
from more than one viewpoint—that of
the claimant, the employer, the labor union, the un-employment
compensation board or commission and
perhaps the employment service. Our specific prob-lem,
as unemployment compensation personnel, is to
coordinate these often conflicting views in an at-tempt
to obtain the perfect answer—that attainment
is well nigh impossible.
Specifically we are confronted with the opinion of
the claimant in contrast to, what we hope is, our
impartial opinion. The claimant has a keen personal
*The substance of this article was delivered as a paper
at a Regional Meeting of the Interstate Conference of Em-ployment
Security Agencies held in Richmond, Va., July,
1945.
interest in what is suitable work for him and he is
not interested in definitions of suitable work. If he
does not think a job is suitable he has many reasons
why and frequently his reasons have little relation
to the suitability of work as we consider it. The un-employment
compensation law gives us a definition
of suitable work or rather an outline to follow in
determining suitable work.
An examination of the laws of the states (North
Carolina, Virginia, West Virginia and Maryland) in
this Region, including the District of Columbia,
shows a similarity in this regard, so that in follow-ing
the Maryland Law practical application is being
made of the laws of these other states.
To interpret these provisions of the unemploy-ment
compensation laws equitably and to the under-
FALL, 1945 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 1 05
standing and satisfaction of the claimant, in this
post-war period, requires the wisdom of Solomon and
the courage of Daniel.
WAGES, HOURS AND
CONDITIONS OF WORK
Work is considered unsuitable for a claimant "if
the wages, hours, or other conditions of the work
offered are substantially less favorable to the in-dividual
than those prevailing for similar work in the
locality." (Maryland Law, Sec. 5(c) (2).)
WAGES
What will be the basis for comparison in order to
determine suitable wages for particular types of
work in the post-war period; will it be the pre-war
period beginning with the effectiveness of the un-employment
compensation laws to the middle of 1940
when the defense program began; or the period of
intensive war work ; or the post-war period ?
Will a comparison of the pre-war wage scale and
the wage scale during the war assist in reaching an
average wage, which will represent the post-war
wage scale ? Or, will it be an average wage derived
from a comparison of the pre-war wages and the
wages offered after the war? Or, will the war time
wage be the basis for determining a reasonable wage
in the present post-war period.
One view is that the last wages received by the
individual (in war work) will not be a fair basis for
reaching a wage rate in the future because of the
abnormally high average weekly earnings, but that
from an analysis of the wages offered for particular
types of work after the war an average rate can be
determined.
Another, and this is the view I incline to, is that
the war work rates, because of restrictions imposed
by the Federal Government, did not represent a sub-stantial
increase, if any, in rates and should be the
basis for any reasonably fair determination of the
post-war wage rates.
Actually, the high wages paid to war workers
were not due in the main to an increase of hourly
or piece work rates, but to the long hours which
resulted in time and a half and double time for over-time
work, plus a bonus for work on the night shifts.
There has been a substantial decrease in the pay
envelope because of reduced working hours (and for
thousands of workers there is not even any longer
a pay envelope) , but in considering a wage rate it is
the rate per hour for straight time, or on the weekly
basis of wages for a 40-hour week.
HOURS
Hours of work during the war were long and
changing; all war industries exceeded 40 hours a
week ; there were three shifts in most plants ; work-ers
in many instances had to take their turn on all
three shifts.
We remember the objections raised by claimants
against six and seven days a week work; against
shift work. Then came the complaint, as hours of
work were reduced, that unless they have overtime
work their earnings would be reduced ; applicants be-gan
objecting to work which did not present the op-portunity
for overtime.
The demand for overtime cannot be considered as
legitimate reason for refusing employment, when
there is not the need for overtime; generally, there
will be very little overtime, if any at all. The con-sensus
of opinion, so far as I have been able to
gather, is that normal hours of work will be 40 hours
a week. The out-of-state claimant who quit employ-ment
when hours were reduced, with the consequent
decrease in earnings, placed himself in the position
where the suitability of work for him must be judged
from the circumstances surrounding work which
might exist in his home community.
A demand by a claimant for shift work, with the
bonus for night work, will be unreasonable when,
probably, there is no occasion for more than one
shift in most industries. There will be some shift
work in isolated plants, and if an individual can be
placed therein so much the better, otherwise day
work is suitable work.
The tendency back to day work for women
should not be disqualifying, unless it is the custom
and practice of the industry to which she applies to
operate on two or more shifts.
During the conversion period there will be a con-siderable
reduction in hours of work, as one of the
results of conversion might be the spreading of
hours of work so as to provide employment for dis-charged
war workers and returning veterans. Peace
time production may, however, provide not only
regular full-time employment, but a great deal of
overtime. If there is a tendency to overtime work,
a refusal of employment requiring overtime will be
unreasonable. An exception is noted in regard to
women workers, where family and household respon-sibilities
again can be given more consideration.
During the war period family and household duties,
except where very young children were involved,
were not considered as good cause for refusing other-wise
suitable work, but now the swing is back to a
more liberal attitude in this connection. However, it
is probable that many women will return to their
homes or change over to employment other than in-dustrial,
but where the worker holds out for a type
of work (which there is little likelihood of obtaining)
which requires overtime or shift work meanwhile ob-jecting
to either, her objection would be without
good cause.
CONDITIONS OF WORK
The subject of conditions of work will be treated
generally, since it is impossible to go into each ques-tion
which might arise. There was a general im-provement
in working conditions during the war, al-though
Labor says some of its privileges were re-laxed
so as not to hinder the war effort. Whether
Management will drop all or some of these improve-ments
time will tell. No doubt Labor will try and re-gain
the privileges it suspended or gave up during
the war, as well as struggle to retain the gains made.
However, when we consider the question of work-ing
conditions, I believe the manner in which we
handled it in these past years will be as safe a means
PAGE 1 06 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY FALL, 1945
as any. Comparing the conditions the claimant ob-jects
to with similar conditions in the industry; here,
as formerly, it will be the obligation of the claimant
to prove to the satisfaction of the unemployment
compensation agency that the condition or conditions
complained of are bad, whether he refers to safety,
sanitation, lighting, location, etc., or whether he does
not like the shape of the foreman's nose. If the ob-jection
is that the machine he must operate has a left
foot pedal rather than a right foot pedal, then the
claimant ought to start using his left foot (unless he
has only a right foot).
PROSPECT OF GETTING LOCAL
WORK VERSUS OUT-OF-TOWN WORK
Several questions raise their heads here ; the work-er
whose work had been entirely in the area where
he lives; the worker who never has had industrial
employment in his home area ; the worker who had a
low paying job in his home locality and removed tem-porarily
to a place where there was industrial em-ployment
; and the worker who always has travelled
from place to place in the practice of his trade.
The worker who never has had industrial em-ployment
or regular employment of any kind, ex-cluding
odd jobs, in his home locality, who returns
home after employment elsewhere has terminated
and who refuses to leave his home for suitable work
in another area removes himself from the labor mar-ket
and is unavailable for work. He never had work
in his home area and the likelihood is that he never
will have work there; if unemployment compensa-tion
benefits were a reward for past employment,
then he would be paid; but unemployment com-pensation
benefits are for persons unemployed
through no fault of .their own. The continued unem-ployment
of such an individual would be due to his
voluntary act in refusing to go to a place where
there is work. It is not unreasonable to offer that
person work which may require him to leave his
home locality, if the other conditions of suitability
are met in the work offered to him.
It would be unreasonable to offer work out-of-town
to an individual who has lived and worked in
one place if there is prospect of work for him in his
locality. If his type of work leaves the town or city,
he will not be expected to follow it immediately ; he
ought to be permitted a period of time (which will
vary with the circumstances of each case) in which
to find other suitable work. Then either he ought
to change his work requirement or accept out-of-town
employment. He cannot demand benefits if he
refuses to change to other employment locally, while
insisting that he remain fixed in his residence.
The applicant who had a low paying job in his
home locality before the war and returned home,
after having had employment in war work elsewhere,
must be available for work similar to that which he
had before the war or work which is to be had in
his locality at the wages, hours and under the cir-cumstances
prevailing for that work, or he must be
willing to accept employment out-of-town. To re-fuse
local work because his last employment in war
work away from home was of a different kind, with
higher earnings, etc., while preferring to remain at
home where work within his immediate prior expe-rience
is not available would disqualify the claimant.
If he is willing to accept work locally and the work
exists, although there may not be any immediate
openings, the claimant would be eligible for benefits.
Where it has been and is the custom of the trade
for a worker to travel from place to place, in the
performance of his work, a refusal of work because
it is out-of-town would be sufficient to disqualify the
claimant.
IMMEDIATE PRIOR EARNINGS
IN WAR INDUSTRY VERSUS NORMAL
PEACE-TIME INDUSTRY EARNINGS
What are "normal peace-time industry earnings?"
This will be an important and recurring question in
the years just ahead. My opinion is that we do not
have any criterion to follow. In the years preceding
the war we were not so much in "normal peace-time"
as in the tail end of a depression period with govern-ment-
created jobs and a somewhat artificial wage
structure. In the discussion under "Wages" the
opinion was expressed that the war industry wages
would be the best gauge for ascertaining industry
earnings in this period of post-war conversion. There
will be necessary adjustments in wage rates, and a
gradual development of peace-time wage rates in in-dustry.
Our tendency should be, where a wage rate
for comparable work drops considerably below the
war-time rate, to make comparison with the rate
prior to the war, at the same time remembering the
increased living costs and increased income taxes
still confronting the worker.
Many workers will have to return to work which
does not pay and did not pay them the earnings they
had in war industry. A demand for earnings in the
former work equal to their war earnings is not
justified. Even those workers who remain in work
similar to that which they had in war industry, per-haps
for the same employer, may complain that their
earnings have been reduced, not in the rate, but in
reduction of hours or smaller volume of work (piece
work) ; such complaint if offered as reason for quit-ting
or refusing any offer of otherwise suitable work
is without merit. The working hours in war time
have been abnormal; the volume of work also was
abnormal. The ratings held by many workers were
abnormal in that persons of limited qualifications
had been in either supervisory capacities or in jobs
that in normal times would be considered beyond
their skill and experience. With a return to peace-time
standards, the worker should adjust himself
accordingly; any contrary demand might be cause
for disqualification.
Considered from the standpoint of wage scale,
there will not be much difference between the war
time and the post-war wage. There will be a dif-ference,
often quite substantial, due primarily to the
decrease in working hours, which neither the em-ployer
nor the applicant can control, and the worker
should conform to existing circumstances. The
problem of providing jobs in substantial volume dur-ing
this period will depend, to some extent, upon
whether one worker will be employed long hours so
he can maintain a high earnings level, or whether
FALL. 1945 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 107
more than one worker will have a job for a normal
work week. The demands of the claimant will be
considered in the light of the policies and practices
which develop in industry after the war, and their
reasonableness determined.
REQUIREMENT AS TO JOINING UNION
This question must be approached from two
angles—whether the claimant is to retain his free-dom
of choice regarding union membership, or
whether he should accept (involuntarily) the benefits
of union membership in order to obtain employment.
The unemployment compensation laws are silent
on this point, so that by inference and interpretation
it can be held that refusal to accept work because
union membership is required constitutes a refusal
of suitable work. There has always been some doubt
whether the unemployment compensation laws are
not discriminatory in this matter. If an applicant
cannot be required to "resign from or refrain from
joining any bona fide labor organization," then why
should he be disqualified for failure to accept work
which would require him to join a bona fide labor
organization ?
If a claimant does not want to belong to a union, he
may have many good or even foolish reasons for his
attitude, depending upon the other person's point of
view, but he ought to have the privilege of making
a free choice without the shadow of a possible dis-qualification
hanging over him.
PRIOR TRAINING AND EXPERIENCE
This is a problem which will come up with fre-quency
in the era of peace ahead. The individual
who was in an industry before the war may not be
difficult to handle ; there will be some place for him
in that industry when it reconverts, and a short
period of time may be the only element involved.
The persons who went from school or work far re-moved
from industrial employment into war work
will be faced, many of them, with the question of re-adjustment.
This applies, too, to many who were not
employed at all prior to the war.
The first effort should be to try and refer the
claimant to the same type of work he was doing ; sec-ondly,
refer him to related work ; thirdly, divert his
abilities into work where he can be readily trained
;
and finally, if the training and experience gained in
a war industry cannot be utilized in peace-time, then
the applicant must be diverted into new work or to
work performed prior to the war. This will be a
matter of education, and a real job is here for the em-ployment
service.
From the standpoint of suitable work, however,
the claimant should be permitted a reasonable length
of time, during which he is receiving benefits, within
which to obtain work in line with his training and
experience. The period of unemployment will vary
with the circumstances of each case, but after that
time it will be up to the claimant to cooperate by go-ing
into new and related work.
A claimant cannot hold out indefinitely for work
which may have ceased entirely or where the pros-pects
of obtaining such work are remote. An offer
of work is suitable if the claimant's training and ex-perience
can be utilized and the employer is willing
to afford him the necessary training.
Offering a claimant work in line with his pre-war
experience would be an offer of suitable work, if the
chances of employment in work similar to "his war
work experience are meagre.
NATURE OF DISQUALIFICATION
There is no definite yard stick for the measure-ment
of disqualifications. The possibility does exist
that in the post-war period an individual's failure to
accept, what under the circumstances of his case
would be, suitable work will necessitate a determina-tion
of unavailability ; however, such a determination
will be based on all facts surrounding him and not
merely because the claimant refused employment.
Where an individual persists in refusing to accept
suitable work the maximum disqualification in num-ber
of weeks will be warranted, perhaps on more
than one occasion.
If during what is considered a reasonable period
of unemployment an individual refuses work, which
might subsequently be considered suitable because
his chances of securing other work have decreased,
then there should not be any disqualification. Later
on, beginning with a moderate penalty, a disqualifi-cation
would be necessitated.
Those individuals who because of lack of work in
an industrial area return to their former homes,
where employment opportunities do not exist, will
be eligible for benefits so long as suitable work (again
the circumstances of each case will be controlling)
is not available or offered to them. Disqualifications
will follow failures to apply for or accept work
offered.
RESEARCH REPORT
America has a good chance of getting through the
present reconversion period without mass unemploy-ment
or severe business dislocation, according to sub-stantial
opinion among the country's leading econo-mists
who are participating in a symposium on
"Financing American Prosperity."
The Twentieth Century Fund, an institute for
scientific research in current economic problems be-lieves
that "the great majority of war workers" were
doing exactly the kind of work during the war they
will do in time of peace. The average amount of un-employment
during the first year after the war with
Japan will be around 4.5 million.
Only about five million war workers were em-ployed
in plants which will make large permanent
lay-offs and approximately 10 per cent of war work-ers
were in plants where engineering problems of
conversion will halt production as long as 4 months.
To safeguard the country against deflation, the
government should facilitate a quick shift from war
production to civilian production, reform the tax
system, extend and liberalize unemployment com-pensation
schemes, and plan prompt expenditures on
the repair and maintenance of public property. To
guard against a disorderly rise in prices, the govern-ment
should retain price controls and the regulation
of consumer credit throughout the period of conver-sation
and probably for a year or two longer.
PAGE 1 08 THE U. C C. QUARTERLY FALL, 1945
The Law in Action
By Bruce Billings, Sen
During the three months period ending August
31, 1945, the Commission handed down decisions in
ten cases involving benefit rights of claimants. In
six of these cases, the question of the availability of
the individuals for work under the Unemployment
Compensation Law was presented. In two of these
cases, the claimants voluntarily separated from their
employment and had been denied statements of
availability by the War Manpower Commission for
a period of sixty days. The Commission held such
individuals to be ineligible during the period for
which they were denied statements of availability
under Commission Statement of Policy Number 9
which at that time provided, "That any claimant who
as a prerequisite to employment is required to
possess a statement of availability or its equivalent
under the rules and regulations of the War Man-power
Commission shall not be considered available
for work within the meaning of the Unemployment
Compensation Law during any period with respect to
which he does not possess or is unable to procure
such statement or its equivalent * * *" It is well
to note in this connection that this statement of
policy is now obsolete and ineffective since the recent
lifting of the manpower restrictions.
In two cases it was found that the claimants had
so restricted the conditions under which they would
accept employment that the possibility and prospect
of such individals securing employment was practi-cally
eliminated, and it was therefore determined
that such individuals were not available for work
within the meaning of the law. In one of these
instances, the claimant refused to accept any work
except with her last employer on the first shift and
in one particular department in which she formerly
worked. The claimant in the other case referred
to had been unemployed for thirteen months and had
never earned more than $18.00 a week in employ-ment,
but made it a condition that she receive at
least $35.00 per week in any work offered her. In
view of the length of claimant's unemployment and
her previous earnings, it was held that she was not
available for work. It was decided, however, in an-other
case that a claimant who was the mother of
two small children had not unreasonably restricted
her availability when she was willing to accept any
suitable work on the first shift and had made ar-rangements
for the care of her children during the
working hours of the first shift. In the only other
instance involving availability it was determined that
the mother of a small child who could not make ar-rangements
for the care of the child in case she was
offered suitable work and for that reason could not
accept suitable work, did not meet the eligibility re-quirement
of availability.
In the only case involving a procedural question,
the Commission upheld the decision of the Appeals
Deputy dismissing the claimant's appeal when such
appeal was not entered within the time required by
statute and when the claimant could not show any
good reasons for not noting the appeal within the
time required by statute.
ior Attorney, U. C. C.
When a claimant was offered work as a sander at
50c an hour, and it appeared that such individual
had recently undergone an operation and was un-able
to perform work of such arduous nature, and
when it further appeared that such person had good
reason to believe that he would secure work of less
arduous nature within a short time at a rate of 85c
an hour, it was held that he did not refuse available
suitable work without good cause and no disqualifi-cation
was inflicted.
In a case in which the claimants—employees of a
full fashion hosiery mill were unemployed due to a
labor dispute between the knitters in the plant and
the management, the Commission determined that
all such claimants-employees were ineligible for bene-fits
for the reason that the work performed by all
such individuals was of the same general type and
that their jobs were part of a chain of production and
that the operation of one group depended upon the
continuance of the work of the others. The Commis-sion
found that the relationship existing between the
jobs of the claimants-employees and the jobs of those
who voluntarily quit work placed the claimants and
those workers in the same class of workers, and that
such individuals were therefore ineligible for benefits
under Section 96-14 (d) (2) of the Law which pro-vides
that any individual shall be disqualified for
benefits for any week with respect to which it is
found that his unemployment is due to a stoppage
of work which exists because of a labor dispute at
the factory at which he is or was last employed un-less
such individual shows to the satisfaction of the
Commission that he does not' belong to a grade or
class of workers of which immediately before the
commencement of the stoppage there were members
employed at the premises at which the stoppage oc-curred
any of whom are participating in or financing
or directly interested in the dispute.
The Commission handed down opinions in ten
cases involving interpretations of the coverage sec-tion
of the law. In eight of these cases the employ-ing
units were held to be liable under the statute for
contributions on wages earned by employees. Three
of the cases involved the question as to whether the
employer had worked eight or more individuals in
twenty different weeks in a calendar year. In two
cases liability was found to exist and in one case the
Commission found there was no liability. There were
three cases decided which involved interpretation of
what was formerly the contractors clause in the law.
(Amended 3-13-45). In two of these cases the em-ployer
was found to be liable for contributions on the
earnings paid to employees of a contractor who was
performing services for such employer in the course
of the employer's usual business and in the other
case of this kind the Commission found no liability
for the reason that the services being performed by
the contractor were not in the principal's usual trade
or business. One employer was liable under the law
by virtue of having acquired substantially all the
assets, organization, and business of an employer
who at the time of such acquisition was a covered
employer under the Act. In another opinion, the
FALL, 1945 THE U. C C. QUARTERLY PAGE 1 09
Commission determined and held that gratuities and
tips were taxable wages under the Law. In one
instance, it was decided that solicitors for a laundry
who owned their own trucks and who were paid on
a percentage basis according to the amount of laun-dry
brought in by them were performing services in
employment under the Act. In interpreting the sec-tion
of the law relative to termination of coverage it
was determined that when an individual once be-comes
an employer under the act and subsequently
sells his business to another and then later reenters
business, that such individual continues to be a cov-ered
employer if he has never applied for and been
granted termination of coverage as provided under
the law. In defining what is agricultural labor under
the statute, it was determined that where an indi-vidual
bought hogs and livestock and maintained a
place where he fed them until they were in a mar-ketable
condition, and then sold them to various
packing companies, when such activity was not con-nected
with a farm and no grain or other feed was
grown by the individual to feed such livestock it was
concluded that the persons in the employ of such in-dividual
who performed services in the furtherance
of this business were not engaged in agricultural
labor but were engaged in a commercial enterprise
and therefore, wages earned by such individuals were
taxable under the law.
Unemployment Benefits-Picture Story from Claim to Check
By S. F. Teague, Chief Claims Deputy
Mr. S. F. Teague at his desk in the Central Raleigh Office. As
head of the Commission's Claims Department all claims
operations and business relating to claimants is under his
supervision. (Photo by R. C. Yates, Jr.)
Unemployment compensation is filling the gap be-tween
war jobs and peace jobs on an increasing scale.
The unemployment compensation program is espe-cially
suited to play this major role during industrial
reconversion—it is designed to provide a partial in-come
for covered workers during periods of tem-porary
unemployment.
For many workers, the filing of a claim for un-employment
benefits is a new experience. Their
knowledge of the procedure for filing, at the best, is
of a general nature only; they know little of how a
claim is taken and processed by the Commission and
the benefit checks finally mailed.
This illustrated article is intended to aid public un-derstanding
of the procedure followed in handling
unemployment benefits, from the time a claimant ap-plies
at a local employment office until he receives
his check for weeks of no work.
First Step. When a worker is unemployed and un-able
to find another job, he should go to the nearest
Employment Service Office. The Unemployment
Compensation Commission of North Carolina has
claims-takers located in all these offices throughout
the state.
A basic test as to whether or not a particular work-er
is unemployed—is whether or not he is seeking
work which he cannot find. Under the Unemploy-ment
Compensation Law, registering for work at a
public employment office constitutes evidence that
the worker is seeking work. A requirement for
eligibility to unemployment compensation is that the
claimant be able to work and available for work.
Consequently the first step for any worker who
loses his job is to register for work at an Employ-ment
Service Office. If the Employment Service
has a job order for which the worker is reasonably
fitted, he will be referred to the new employer.
Second Step. While he is making his first call at
the Employment Service Office, the unemployed
worker also files his claim for unemployment insur-ance
benefits. He should be sure to do this, before he
leaves the office, so that the process of looking up
First step—register for work. Registration for work comes
first in the unemployment claims procedure. At the registra-tion
desk, an applicant's work history is taken, and if there is
a job order on file which his work background indicates he can
fill, he is given a referral to that employer. Pictured here is
the reception of an applicant in one of the local Employment
Offices.
PAGE 1 1 THE U. C. C. QUARTERLY FALL, 1945
his wage record account and determining the amount
of his weekly benefit check may be started. It may
be several weeks before he actually begins on a new
job. If he delays in filing a claim, he may lose out
on benefits that would otherwise be due him. Time
lost in filing a claim for insurance, is not compen-sable.
The date on which a first claim is filed, is the
date from which insurance payments are figured.
There is a one week "waiting period," and benefits
begin with a subsequent continued claim covering
the second full week of unemployment.
Filing a claim means that the worker is inter-viewed
by a claims-taker for the Unemployment
Compensation Commission, and asked, among other
things, to give his name, address, Social Security
number, name of most recent employer, and cause
for unemployment, the amount of his earnings for
the week for which he is filing, and if he is able and
available for work.
This information is entered on an initial claim
which serves as an application to determine benefit
rights. The claim is s